


Heartbreak Grows in the Garden

by Freyjabee



Series: Sleeping Sickness [2]
Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: Angst, Cana's story, Discovery, Drugs, Experimentation, F/F, F/M, Family, Multi, Multiple Partners, Romance, Secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-08-21 19:10:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 21
Words: 41,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16582370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Freyjabee/pseuds/Freyjabee
Summary: This is the story of all the hearts Cana has left in pieces, including her own.





	1. Chapter 1

It's going to break my little heart

* * *

 

The roar of Cana's salvaged 1939 Harley-Davidson F-Head engine was loud enough to drown out her thoughts. She still had Whitehorse's _Nighthawks_ blaring out of her earbuds, though. Needed to, because as she rounded the corner toward the old movie theater, she cut the engine and rolled her motorcycle through the abandoned street and it was when it was quiet like this that she thought _too much_.

The soles of her leather boots tread over the ground without sound and shadows hid her progress. The only noise to pierce the early fall air was her fingerless leather gloves clenching and unclenching on the handlebars.

The theater, and thus her destination, came into view. It was grey brick, single storey, and older than time. Fifteen years ago, when a larger and more state-of-the-art theater was put in the next town over, the owner had boarded up the windows and split. Cana supposed if she'd been older at the time, she would have been sad. As it was, she grew up with the abandoned building and loved it as such. It had done well by her just as it was.

The Harley went beneath the awning, its red and chrome shining in no light; the theater was dark and two years ago, the streetlight adjacent to it had burned out and the town had _still_ yet to fix it. Cana swung her satchel over her shoulder and then touched the front door and checked the lock. It had been broken ages and ages ago and still remained that way. She pulled on the handle and the door swung open silently, considering. She'd been one of the ones to bring a can of WD-40 out this way and spray it. The cops didn't typically bother them there but there was one surly old woman that would _listen_ for the squeal of the theater's door and then she'd call. Cana had no interest in cutting out early tonight.

Scarlet carpet had dulled to grey. Movie posters had curled and bubbled— _Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Lilo and Stitch, Men in Black II_. Time took everything new and used it until it was torn and frayed and worthless.

Cana went for the theater that had been playing _Lord of the Rings_. She knew that when he came here, it was to lose himself in a fantasy and Elfman had a poet's heart. He'd find something perversely perfect about stewing in his own angst in that room.

This door was a little louder. Cana peeked down the long, dark aisle and saw the candle flickering near the big screen. She felt relief she didn't think she _would_ feel and went to him. He was lying flat on his back with his hands locked behind his head, staring at the ceiling. The dark jeans and black long-sleeved T-shirt he wore almost made him invisible and Cana thought maybe that's what he _wanted_. His hair stood out, though, taking that away from him.

"Hey." Cana crossed her legs and dropped down beside his hips, close enough that she could feel the heat coming from his body. He was the only warm thing in this place; her breath was on the verge of showing itself.

Elfman didn't look away from the ceiling. "Hey."

Cana squinted. His cheek looked bruised. "Fighting again?"

Elfman grunted noncommittally.

"One day they're going to catch on and kick you out of the bars before you can even get in."

"Already got banned from Fairy Tail," he said.

Cana thought about all the things she could say. _Should,_ if she was a better friend. Things like, ' _fighting isn't going to bring her back.'_ And, ' _You're just punishing yourself, not solving anything_.' Or, _'You need_ help _, Elfman. You need to see someone._ ' "Drink with me?" didn't make the list, but that's what she said.

Elfman sat up on his elbow and Cana took that as acceptance. Her poison of choice was vodka. Not because it tasted good but because she could pour it into a water bottle and _most_ of the time, no one questioned her. It got her dizzy and falling down in no time. It made her thoughts quiet without much effort. She took a sip and shivered. Elfman took one and sputtered at first. Another shot dulled that and on the third, he didn't even flinch. By the seventh, he'd dropped his dour mood and laughed and Cana joined in. The ninth had him grabbing her jeaned hips and pulling her into his lap. She went because this was what she'd come for. She didn't need a drinking buddy; she could get wrecked all on her own. She couldn't fuck herself with the same skill, though.

Elfman tasted like vodka and his hands were a force of nature, large but not clumsy. There was something to be said about being handled like that. It made Cana wet and a little bit giddy, too, to feel like she was in control of all _this._ Everything in her life was spiraling down a long, dark rabbit hole but in _this,_ she held the power.

Her music changed to Lana del Rey's _Carmen_ and she closed her eyes, numb even when Elfman took her by the hips and lifted her to her feet. Numb even when he pushed off her leather jacket and tugged down the straps of her white tank, numb even when he undid the button of her pants and yanked them down and off one foot. She came alive only when he lied back down and pulled her down on top of him. He was in a condom. That was good. One of them had to be responsible and Cana hadn't ever been that person.

Elfman was a panter. Even when he wasn't doing the work, he made small noises that let her know he was enjoying himself, and when he orgasmed, he all but growled. Not today. Today, when it came, he wrapped his arms tightly around her middle and both sat up and pulled her down. He'd kissed her mouth and between her legs before, he'd groped her and had her in so many ways, she'd lost count, but it was then, embraced, when he arched into her and looked up from beneath his lashes that Cana knew that somehow, somewhere along the way, they'd crossed the line from 'just fucking' to drown out the ghosts that haunted them into very, very dangerous territory.

Elfman's hips slowed and his palms splayed out on her back; they were warm, though his hands were rough. His body twitched deep inside of her, still spreading her so, so wide. She still liked it, though her libido was slowly being smothered by that look Elfman wore. "What does that look mean?" Cana heard herself ask. _Why_ did she ask? She didn't want to know, not really.

Elfman's chest rose and fell twice and then he blurted, "I think I love you."

Cana laughed first. "I think you're drunk."

"I thought it before I was drunk," he replied.

"No, you didn't, Elfman."

"Yes, I did. I was lying here, looking at the ceiling thinking that the theater is a pretty good place but it's not the same, Cana. Not when I'm here on my—"

Cana broke his grasp and stood. She almost couldn't find her pants and then remembered that they were still trapped around her one ankle. She yanked them on but forgot about her underwear. They bunched up just below her crotch and Cana didn't bother to fix it.

Elfman stumbled to his feet and spent the time taking off his condom and finding his own pants before saying, "Where are you going?"

"Home," Cana said.

Elfman sighed and that was all. He didn't ask her to stay or hold her hand and sell her more lines and that was _fantastic_ in Cana's opinion. She left him in the theater and pretended that she didn't know what the forlorn expression on his face meant. What did Elfman Strauss know about love anyway? Most people had to cultivate it; fertilize, water, tend, but it seemed like for the Strausses, it had always just grown in the garden.


	2. Chapter 2

Between a crucifix and the Hollywood sign, we decided to get hurt. Now there's a few things we have to burn.

Set our hearts ablaze

* * *

Her name sounded like a waterfall and her hair was first bleached and then dyed to resemble one, too. The colour wasn't complete, white mixed in with the ocean blue; water tumbled over rocks the way the tresses of her hair cascaded over her shoulders.

She'd met Juvia at the bar downstairs two nights before and all of the things Cana knew about her could be counted on one hand. 1) Juvia wore a cross and not just for pleasure or style. She _believed._ Honest to goodness. 2) She also claimed she hated it but couldn't take it off. 3) Juvia loved a boy and lost that love because she loved too much. 4) Juvia had never just laid out on some shitty bed in some shitty motel room with two others, drunk as fuck while a party they were _supposed_ to be attending raged in the room next door. Tonight she did. Tonight, she kissed a man that had, at one point, been only her best friend. Now, his cock was out and between her breasts and Cana knew she was using it as a perverse source of comfort. That was fine. If she needed a dick on her while Cana worked between her legs, then that's what the lady would get.

Nails painted black dug into Cana's leather gloves, legs sheathed in fishnet stockings wrapped around her shoulders. The man got off Juvia's chest and got behind Cana. She watched Juvia's face to see if she was jealous. No. Not then. Maybe never, not for this. Juvia didn't love _this_ man. He spread Cana wide and inched in and he wasn't as thick as Elfman or as attentive, really. Now that Cana had an impartial lover, she clearly saw the difference and was so, so glad for it. Elfman was long gone and here was something she didn't know. Someone she didn't care about and they didn't care about her.

He went in deep and bottomed out and it hurt more than it felt good but Cana moaned anyway, just to hear something other than her thoughts. Juvia moaned, too, and switched from holding Cana's hands to her hair and shoved her face in closer between her legs. Cana focused more on this girl, this girl that had stumbled out of her church glassy eyed three days before Cana ever met her, this girl that used to wear dresses buttoned to her throat but now settled for things she spilled out of, this girl that used to have hair the colour of gingersnaps to go with her eyes as blue as the ocean, this girl that still had a cute spattering of freckles that covered her cheeks and her nose, this girl that had never fucked a woman but told Cana upfront that that's exactly what she wanted.

Juvia was a special girl.

She twitched against Cana's tongue and then she was coming and the man behind Cana was fucking her harder and Cana couldn't feel a goddamn thing. Not pain anymore, not pleasure. All she could think was _Juvia is a special girl. Juvia is a special girl._

She was a _special_ girl. Not a nobody. A _real_ girl.

Juvia pushed Cana away so Cana never had to run. "Fuck me, Gajeel." That was his name. Gajeel. Days ago, he'd been the shadow to Juvia's sun, but now she slummed in the dark with him and Cana could relate. He pulled out of Cana and Cana moved back completely, giving him space. She went for her water bottle on the counter and was glad for the way vodka burned her throat almost raw. She drank again and again to the sounds of Juvia's high-pitched moans.

It was there, with her water bottle against her lips, that she heard a very loud and very distinct sound from the room next door. Voices, commanding entry.

She pursed her lips and capped the vodka. Gajeel still pounded into Juvia and didn't show any signs of slowing. Cana adjusted the skater dress she wore and got on her combats. Her leather jacket came next. She looked toward the door and thought _no, thanks,_ when feet pounded up the stairs. The balcony it was, then.

She had her keys out and the balcony door open when they started hammering on the front door. Gajeel stopped mid-thrust to look over his shoulder and Juvia was still oblivious.

"Open up!"

"Is that the fucking cops?"

"You got it, hoss." Cana shouldn't have taken the time to confirm his question; the seconds she wasted meant that their door was burst open. Men in black police uniforms and helmets rushed in. They weren't just regular cops; they were part of a raid unit. Two of them backed out with a battering ram and more filled their space, guns drawn.

"What the fuck?" Gajeel wondered but Cana already knew.

"Drugs are next door, boys. You got the wrong room."

Cana's blasé attitude was wasted on them. "Put your hands on top of your head and get on the floor." They sounded serious.

Cana tried again. "Did you not hear me? We got nothing in here."

"On the ground, _hands on your head_!"

Gajeel complied, though his dick was out, Juvia, too. Cana inched toward the bannister and two guns pointed her way. "Seriously. We're not selling anything. We're not even _using._ We're just drinking and having a good time," she said defensively.

The team lead nodded at one of his officers and they detached. Cana saw his intention immediately and scurried for the railing. She wasn't nearly fast enough, too uncoordinated, maybe, or maybe she _wanted_ to get arrested.

This wasn't the first time she'd had her cheek pressed into the ground, not even by a cop. She went with resignation after that.

* * *

The cell reserved for intoxicated persons in Magnolia's only jail was small and dingy and reeked not only of freshly poured concrete but chemicals, too, used to cover up the scent of piss and vomit.

Juvia sat on the bench across from Cana, staring up at the ceiling, palms skyward, tears streaming down her face. Cana watched with detachment that bordered anger. "Why are you crying?"

Juvia blinked. "We're in jail." _Obviously_ , her tone said.

"We're in the drunk tank," Cana snapped.

"And our girl Cana here knows there's a difference."

Cana kept her eyes trained on Juvia while Juvia eyed the officer with eyes as wide as medallions. Oh, yes, Juvia was a good girl. Cana didn't know what to feel looking at her now. She'd known that the fishnets and the nail polish and the blue lipstick and hair dye had been a front but here was proof in living colour. Juvia was just a girl in Cana's fucked up ride.

"I'm not drunk anymore," Cana said to the wall. She could tell he was trying to catch her eye but she refused to look his way. _Would not_ , not for anything.

"Cana..."

"You didn't find any dope on us, did you?"

"Your friend had some."

"He wasn't my friend, just some dick I found." Literally. Juvia winced. Cana kept going. "Neither of us even knew he had it and we're sober now."

"I can't let you drive like this."

"I'll take a cab," she responded. "And get my bike tomorrow." No more cruiser rides. If she showed up at Fairy Hills in another she'd lose her spot.

The silence was long and tense. Almost familiar, though, for Cana, who had what felt like a lifetime of experience with long, drawn out silences. "I'll call you a cab," he said eventually. "Wait here." His boots sounded over the concrete floor and a door at the end of the hall banged open and closed.

Juvia asked, "Do you know him?"

"Well enough."

"Because this happens to you a lot?"

Cana responded with the silent treatment. Juvia's tears came with more frequency. She had the decency to cry silently for ten whole minutes until the cop returned with his keys freed from his belt. He opened the door and said, "Cab's out front."

Cana got to her feet and didn't wobble despite still being in the thick of a drunk. She was a professional. Magnolia's jail was familiar enough that she navigated all on her own and her favourite police officer didn't try to lead her out.

"Stay out of trouble, ladies," he said at her back and Cana gave him the finger. He sighed, she sighed, and Juvia sniffled.

The yellow cab sat beneath the streetlight. Rain misted through the headlights. Cana grabbed for the front door, Juvia for the back but Cana held her door closed, preventing her from getting in.

"What are you doing?" Juvia looked so, so ingénue.

Cana looked at her long and hard. "Get a different cab."

"What?"

"Go home, Juvia. Without me. Go to confession, tell your man you're sorry for being so pathetic and start over again; better this time." She could do it, Cana knew she could.

"Cana—"

"I'm serious and not at all sorry."

"But—"

"This isn't what you're looking for."

"Cana—"

Cana pulled open the door and got in.

"Cana! Please—"

Cana slammed the door in her face and addressed the cabdriver—a middle aged man with more grey than brown in his hair. "Coffin Ridge."

The cabby said, "He said you'd try to get back to that dump bar. I was paid to take you home, missy."

Cana didn't know what was worse, being so predictable or having _him_ take care of her like an invalid. She fished through her wallet for a hundred-dollar bill. It was going to go toward a new exhaust but she figured this was more important. "Coffin Ridge."

The cabby took the tip like she thought and after getting dropped off, Cana drove her bike home just to spite him.


	3. Chapter 3

The crack inside your fucking heart is me

* * *

Therapy days, surprisingly, were the best days. An hour of his time every Thursday. An hour in which she could watch him squirm and stare at her breasts inappropriately for a man in his position. She wore leather shorts today, though the days were getting colder, and a crop top that she knew he'd disapprove of for obvious reasons.

When she walked into his office, Cana felt his tension rise. He was easy to tease. High strung. Horny, in a word. Cana supposed that she was an instigator. Without her influence, though, he would exist in frustrated hell forever, dreaming about acting out his nasty, barely eighteen fantasies with girls that were obviously not his wife without any real-life experience to spice things up. She was doing him a _favour._

Cana closed the door and took herself to the chair opposite his and sat. Mister Conbolt's eyes lingered on her legs; his throat bobbed and Cana smiled.

"Miss Alberona."

"Mister Conbolt." He straightened in his chair, gaining strength from the title. Cana sought to put him on uneven ground again. "I think we know each other well enough by now, can I call you Macao? Mister just seems really formal."

For all his caprices, Macao Conbolt liked to have boundaries, and here, without much effort, she'd reached his. "This is formal, Cana." He realized his slip and flushed.

"See? You prefer it, too." Cana settled back in her chair and stretched her legs out. "What are we talking about today, Macao?"

He looked like he was going to tell her Mister. He let it go, getting smart to the game or deciding that they could push it a little more. They weren't doing anything too offside just _yet_. "We've been seeing each other enough that this could be a self-led session. Do you have anything you want to get off your chest?"

"Mm… I don't know."

"Anything at all, Cana. I'm here to listen."

"I fucked a girl in a motel the other day. I didn't really know her," Cana said plainly. Mister Conbolt had been scratching something in the top of his notepad but his pen abruptly stopped. He didn't look at her, though.

"I see."

"That's all the insight you have? I see?" she challenged. "I thought you'd be better at this than that."

Mister Conbolt lifted his gaze. Whatever he'd been drumming up in his mind, it looked like he was choking on the thoughts, struggling to keep business and fantasy _distinctly_ separate. "You had relations with a girl you didn't know."

Cana sat forward and felt Mister Conbolt's eyes slide down her chest. "Do you want me to tell you about it?"

He adjusted his notebook in his lap and made a concise effort to meet her eyes. "Obviously, you want to talk about it."

Cana took inspiration from the torn look in Mister Conbolt's eye. It wasn't anything overtly lewd, just a feeling, really. She'd seen enough men look at her the same way to spot the subtle change in his demeanor. "I found her in a church. She was a good girl. At first. But when I took off her white lacy panties and got on my knees—"

"Cana," Mister Conbolt interjected. "Please."

She grinned. "I like it when you beg. Fuck. It makes me—"

" _Enough_ ," he wheezed. "Tell me about it without the grizzly detail."

She settled back in her chair. "That's the most interesting part."

He abruptly changed the subject. "How is your job hunt coming?"

Cana drummed her fingers on her knees, displaced but not without grip. "Alright."

"Had any leads yet?"

"Macy's is hiring."

Mister Conbolt's look over his respectable square glasses was deadpan. "Macy's?"

"You like to go there, don't you?"

He snapped his notebook closed with such authority it made Cana jump. "What's been bothering you? Lay it out flat for me, Cana. Stop the games."

"Nothing's bothering me. My time at Fairy Hills is running short, I gotta get a job, I'm telling you about an opportunity and you're being a dick about it," she said and was surprised by the bite in her voice.

He hit the nail on the head with sharp accuracy. "You're leaving us in a few weeks."

Cana picked at her nails and pretended that she wasn't avoiding his gaze. The black nail polish was chipped and thin. She'd have to grab some more off Mira.

"It's scary, taking this step, but understand, you won't be totally on your own, Cana, you'll still have a caseworker assigned to you. You'll be set up in—"

"Fucking assisted housing. I get it. With all the other crack whores and baby mommas. I'll fit right in." She stood, angry and embarrassed, and turned her back on Mister Conbolt.

"Cana!"

She let the door slam.

* * *

Moonlight made diamond strands of Mira's hair and the wind set it to tangling. It smelled of cherry blossom shampoo and hairspray and Cana didn't hesitate to tame the wild locks. Mira barely looked at her, she was busy trying to figure out just exactly who she was. Tonight as they sat on Fairy Hills' roof, she wore fishnets beneath her shorts and combat boots like Cana's, and a red and black top stenciled with roses and thorns. She puffed on a cigarette stolen from Mister Makarov's office and wallowed in the music pouring out of the headphones Cana deigned to share. She used to sing all of Marilyn Manson's lyrics with Cana. Now, she stared at the horizon and Cana could only imagine what she was thinking about. What a silly question. There was only one thing Mira _ever_ thought about these days. Did this music actually make her feel better? Did she still find escape in lyrics and grungy guitars and when _The Speed of Pain_ came on, did she _understand?_ Did she think of Lisanna every time she heard, _the crack inside your fucking heart is_ me? Mira always got a look on her face when that time came and Cana thought she was losing her.

"I got picked up by the cops again the other night," Cana said casually to break the silence and to remember that Mira was her confidant, her partner in crime, the one person in this big fucking world that didn't make her feel claustrophobic when they were close. She wasn't going anywhere.

Mira turned her head and the odd braid she'd ended with a neon bead and dyed fluorescent green knocked together. Yellow streetlight flicked against her many, many necklaces and her earrings, too. Six in her ear, one in her eyebrow, one in her nose and her lip, too. "You did?"

"Yeah. They busted up this shitty party I went to with this chick, looking for coke or something."

"Cana! Mister Dreyar said if you got arrested one more time, your spot was _gone_."

"I know. Sometimes, I think Officer Fucking Do Good just likes to fuck with me. He let me go without calling Mister Dreyar and he paid for a cab ride back."

Mira sighed. "You went to Coffin Ridge again?"

Her tone made Cana defensive. "It's fun."

"If you like crackheads."

"They're not _all_ like that."

Mira's look could rival Mister Conbolt's for dryness. "No? The last time we went, there was that douche with the tattoo that wanted to hook up."

"And he was so high, he couldn't get it going, I know." Cana cackled, though the memory wasn't half as good as she'd like it to be. It made her feel dirty. She'd showered twice the next day and the guy didn't even get it _in._

Mira was more honest about her opinion on the matter. "It was sad. You should be more careful."

"Thanks, mom."

"I'm serious, Cana." Mira looked at her completely and there was real worry in her darkly lined eyes. "You keep doing all this crazy shit and every night you go out, I just sit there and wonder if you're going to come back."

"If you came with me once in a while again, you wouldn't have to worry."

Mira tongued her lip ring. "Elfman…"

"Is a big boy, he can handle himself," Cana said shortly. She didn't _want_ to think about Elfman or talk about him or even exist in the same fucking world as him because she'd just remember him holding her around her middle and looking up at her completely guileless while he said, _'I think I love you.'_ It was just _gross_ to think that he'd led himself down that delusional fucking path.

Cana took a deep breath in. And let it out. "You need to relax some, Mira." She was relieved that she sounded like her old, playful self. "Get out and party and escape for a little bit. Let loose."

Mira sighed and leaned back onto the gravel flat roof, saying neither yes nor no, which in the Language of Mira meant _yes_ in Cana's experience. To celebrate, Cana rooted through her pocket and took out a package of cigarettes she'd gotten the guy at the convenience store to give to her. A smile and a wink went a long, long way, sometimes. She didn't take a cigarette from the tinfoil but a thin joint she'd rolled. Mira watched her through the fake lashes she'd stuck on that night. Cana sparked it up and passed Mira a toke without asking. Mira's black lipstick was sticky and tasted familiar and as long as Cana didn't think about how much that was okay, she wouldn't get stuck on the details.


	4. Chapter 4

****

Complicate.  
Incarcerate.  
Feel my heart wake up.

* * *

Did Mira know that she was so, so beautiful? Did she know that wherever she went, eyes followed her? Did she know that when she started taking off her clothes, breaths seized and thoughts died off? No. No. She was oblivious. She was an oblivious high and she was an oblivious drunk and mixing the two together made her into something magical. What was it about the spaced out look in her eye as she stared up at the moon-and-cloud-dominated sky, dress off, feet and skin bare on grass that was two weeks late for a cutting? Was it the carelessness she had? The complete disassociation she toted while her worshippers gathered around, ready to receive whatever handout she offered?

Cana used to think it was the cruelty in her eyes. She used to be mean to everyone and when she deigned to be nice, it was like being gifted something special and everyone, even if they said awful things about her when she wasn't around, wanted just a little taste. Now the opposite was true. Mira was more nice than she was mean and she was still a heavy hitter.

It was different now, though. Something very, very important had changed in Mira's life and likewise, she was changing to accommodate it. That would have been okay, if Cana didn't _know_ Mira had a problem just then, but as Mira stood naked as she always did, face tipped to the sky, bare feet curling in the grass in a clearing on the edge of Fairy Hills' property, her uncertainty was clear and Cana knew that the one constant thing she'd had in her life was about to go up in a cloud of smoke. She watched it happen, unable to look away from the coming train wreck. There was a specific way Mira liked to do things and Sting (Cana was _sure_ that wasn't his real name—as sure as she was that he wasn't Mira's first pick) did them without flaw, but Mira, numb and dumb Mira, wasn't so numb nor so dumb. High didn't make her loose and lackadaisical, drunk didn't make her hypersensitive and happy.

It made her judgemental and unreceptive.

Cana fought to hold onto the enjoyment she'd been riding just moments before—before she heard Mira's frustrated puff of air and she, too, was forced to think about the reality of their situation. Nothing was doing. Rogue stretched her from behind and he was skilled enough, but no matter what, how she tipped her hips, how she longed to thrust herself into the feeling and forget about everything—she couldn't do it. Mira wasn't having fun and if she wasn't having fun, Cana could think about how _she_ wasn't _really_ having fun, either.

Sting still tried. He kissed Mira's neck and fondled her breasts and told her to get on the ground on her knees. He was still hard, the silly asshole, and didn't know how close he was to one of Mira's fabled tantrums.

"I'm done," Mira pushed away from him.

"What?" Sting still reached for her, even as he asked for clarification.

"Don't," Mira said shortly and Sting's hand fell away.

"Mira." Cana didn't like how much her tone sounded like pleading.

"Sorry, Cana." Mira didn't look at her. She grabbed up her dress and before Cana knew it, she was clothed once more. She left the group without another word.

Cana almost followed her. It felt like getting up and leaving was bringing her whole world shaking down to its foundations, though.

Sting asked, "What's her problem?"

"Nothing." Nothing was a whole lot, but none of that was Sting's business. "Forget about her," Cana said, "Let's just keep going." Rogue still was. Sting turned to Cana and Cana knew already what he was going to ask. She thought a girl unaffected would open her mouth so that's what she did.

* * *

Rain fell from the sky, light and misting. Her leather jacket could more than handle it, though when Mister Conbolt pulled up beside her, Cana took his offered ride because, if she was honest with herself, she wanted to be near someone familiar.

He drove a '71 Beaumont Acadian that smelled like cigarette smoke and Little Trees—Lilac edition—and there was a mess of papers in the backseat. Cana put her seat all the way back and put her legs up on the dash. Mister Conbolt looked her way. The light of the dashboard made his skin kind of green and granted him an unearthly quality. He wasn't beautiful like Mira, he wasn't rakish like Sting and Rogue, he was a lot nervous and smoothed it over with a calmness that came to men in their forties.

He didn't scold her for her wet boots leaving marks on his leather; in fact, he hadn't said much of anything. Cana tried to get him out of his shell a little. "Where were you tonight, Mister Conbolt?" She already knew; she saw the receipt for Macy's on the passenger seat before he could crumple it up and stuff it into his pocket, recognizing the paper trimmed with purple.

"Just out with some colleagues," he said casually.

"At a strip joint?"

If he was embarrassed, the light on the dash covered it up for him and his voice was near-even as he turned the question around on her. "Where were you, Cana?"

"The park."

"So late?"

Cana couldn't tell if he was trying to be an Adult or if he wanted the gritty details. She didn't think Mister Conbolt could, either. "If I did what I wanted there in the middle of the day, I'd be arrested."

"I wish you wouldn't take so many risks."

"No, you don't," Cana said bluntly. "You wish you were out there taking them with me."

He took his eyes off the road to look at her. "Where would you get an idea like that?" He sounded properly indignant.

"It's written all over your face. You wish it was you out there with me tonight, getting fucked in the—"

He cut her off. "You have it all wrong. You're my patient, I want what's best for you." His protests only made him guiltier.

"Really?" She slid her hand over her bare legs to the hem of her shorts where she lingered, following the material around to her outer thigh before she kept on, up over her belly to where her crop top rested two inches above the waistband of her shorts. She pulled it up another inch. Mister Conbolt shifted in his seat. There was no clipboard to cover his erection now. Cana didn't even pretend that she wasn't looking and it made him uncomfortable. Good. She felt like she had all of the control, which made it seem like everything else in her life wasn't spiraling so badly. "Did you want to pull over?"

His fingers flexed on the steering wheel and the leather squeaked. "No, Cana. I do not."

"You're a liar."

His forties cool was slipping and slipping fast. Cana brought her hand up further and the car weaved; he was too busy watching her and not watching the road. He corrected and slowed. Cana thought it was to pull over but it was to make a left-hand turn. Fairy Hills came out of the darkness, the half-way house for teens looking like a towering monster amongst all of the other residential homes. It stood out like a sore thumb, ancient and pale brick when everything around it was new subdivision. There was a tired '02 minivan in the driveway and that was all, the only people that lived there full-time Mister Dreyar himself and the teens Mister Dreyar took in from the streets or salvaged from Children's Aid when the parents were too shitty to get their act together and adoption agencies had a hard time finding homes.

Mister Conbolt stopped on the street at the mouth of the driveway and it seemed that the appearance of the building, his place of work and his sanctuary from his home life, stapled him in reality. He brought himself to look at Cana. "Here we are." The rain started to fall harder from the sky, tinging off the roof and almost taking his words. Cana still heard the strain in them. He could pretend all he liked, he could put on the noble act, he could throw well-meaning questions her way and try to make her think about what she was doing, but she knew he wanted her to keep going. Men like him always did.

Her leather jacket creaked as she sat up and leaned over. Mister Conbolt stiffened when she touched his cheek, frozen in place as she leaned in, and mute. Until she kissed him. Then he pulled away from her and pushed her back at the same time, just as Mira had to Sting. A second passed, two, and then he wiped his mouth. "Get out."

The game was over. It felt like she'd been slapped. Cana opened the door and gladly stepped into the rain. It fell like a torrent then, soaking her through and chilling her to the bone. She walked with reservation up the gravel driveway and under the porch's awning. She smelled his cologne before she saw him, Elfman always wore the same scent, and then she saw the glow of the cigarette he was smoking, though as far as she knew, Elfman never smoked before.

Shadow revealed him bit by bit, and the girl at his side, too. Cana ignored her and looked into Elfman's eyes and knew without a doubt that he'd seen everything on the street. She waited too long for him to say something. Elfman was as silent as he'd been when she left him in the theater. She half-wished he wouldn't be and, contrarily, was glad, too. She fumbled with her key in the door and left him there. The house was dark and quiet; Cana tried to keep it that way, using the light from her phone to see by. In the room that was hers for another six days, she shed her coat and her clothes and climbed into the shower. There she stayed until the water ran cold.


	5. Chapter 5

Don't sink because my heart's not heavy.

* * *

Rain came from the sky in bursting waves. Cana had watched the storm roll in from her favourite spot on the roof and had stayed up there even after the swollen and black clouds had gotten to Fairy Hills. The large red umbrella she held had kept her dry for a solid five minutes and then rainwater had started running over the flat roof and wetted her legs through the torn jeans she wore.

The window behind her opened and Mira came out without invitation. She sat beside Cana, hip-to-hip without an inch of space between them like there was no trouble in paradise.

"Hey." Her voice was almost lost to the tempest.

"Hi," Cana said cautiously.

"What are you doing out here?"

"Watching the storm." Shouldn't that have been obvious? Of course it was, Mira was just trying to make conversation.

Mira settled back. Cana didn't hear the tinkling of the beads in her hair. She cast a sideways glance and saw that Mira had taken out the braid and stripped the green out of her hair, too. She felt a sick weight in her stomach and knew it was panic. She looked for Mira's piercings and was relieved to see that they were still there.

"Did you figure out which apartment is going to be yours?"

"Yeah," Cana mumbled and looked back out at Magnolia stretching below her, a web of lights and noise alive in the storm.

"You move your stuff in on Saturday?"

Two days from then. Cana grunted another affirmation.

"Well... do you want help?" Mira asked.

Cana almost said no. She took her sweet time getting her words out, they were stuck in her hot and small throat. When she finally managed, she said, "Sure."

"Alright." Mira took some time between subject matters. Picking up loose gravel on the roof and letting it fall, piece by piece. "I didn't see you in Mister Conbolt's office today."

"He canceled." He claimed it was a family emergency but Cana thought it more likely that he didn't want to deal with her. She stretched her legs out and sighed.

"Oh."

They sat in silence for another few moments, the rain, and Cana's music—Metric tonight, saying _help, I'm alive,_ in her ear—the only things to make what should have been _easy—_ sitting on the roof with her best friend—not awkward. Mira was the first to shatter the thin layer of ice. She said, "You know, you don't have to worry about moving out. We're still going to see each other." She was so much more perceptive now, getting to the heart of Cana's brooding without much effort. "Nothing's really going to change."

"Everything has already changed," Cana blurted, frustrated. "You're ditching me, I'm getting out of this place, I need to get a job—"

Mira's lips pursed. "I'm sorry I left the other night."

"You just took off!" Cana said though Mira hadn't denied it.

"I was just standing there and that guy was touching me and I just thought, is this how I want to live the rest of my life?"

"Wasted in the park, getting eaten out by some stranger. I know. Only sluts do that." Cana tried to say it scornfully and succeeded. Mira still heard the hurt in her voice.

"That's not what I meant."

"It's what it sounded like—"

Mira was still herself enough to speak over Cana sharply. "You know I don't like that fucking word, don't put it in my mouth." She stood. Cana expected her to storm off. Mira hesitated, her fingers clenching and unclenching, and said, "I'll be over early Saturday."

If that wasn't friendship, Cana didn't know what was. She hated Mira for it. She started to feel frustrated tears and drank that shit away.

* * *

The problem with getting wasted by yourself was that there was no one there to tell you that your dumb ideas were _dumb_. Cana didn't want that voice of reason, either. She threw her umbrella off the tall roof and glanced over the edge to see it hit the soggy ground below. It wobbled in the wind, still open if not a little bent, a red blotch in a sea of green-black. Her heart sped looking at it down there, fluttering and broken. She never thought she was _that_ kind of person before but for just a moment, she let her imagination run wild. What would it be like, she wondered, the fall down? She'd soar through the air less gracefully than her umbrella, definitely. Would she remember hitting the ground?

The umbrella started to tumble away, grabbed by a gust of wind and Cana realized, drunkenly, that she needed to go after it. She found the edge of the roof where the downspout was bolted into the brick with thin pieces of aluminum U's and planned her route. It wasn't very large or very sturdy; it squealed beneath her weight as she put one foot over the edge of the roof and then the other and used the U's as footholds. Rainwater made everything damp and slick. The fear of falling made her descent possible, she clung to the little piece of metal with everything she had. Five feet from the bottom, four of the bolts let go almost simultaneously and Cana figured out what it was to fly. She landed flat on her back with her arms outstretched, palms to the sky, and watched rain fall.

"Cana?"

Cana turned her head slowly and saw a huge figure come out of the darkness. She wasn't scared, she was exasperated. "Elfman."

"Did you just fall? Are you okay?" It had been days since he'd spoken to her but just then, that didn't seem to matter. He came to her side and knelt, uncaring that his knees were getting soaked. Maybe that was because he, too, was soaked through. How long was he out in the rain for without anything to keep him dry? His T-shirt wasn't going to do the trick.

_My umbrella!_ Cana suddenly remembered and rolled away from him. Her bones felt a little rattled but other than a few bruises here and there, she thought that tomorrow, she'd be just fine.

"Cana?"

"I'm _fine_ , Elfman. Geesh." She looked away well before she could see if she hurt him or not and spotted her umbrella at the edge of the treeline. She made a run for it and grabbed it just before it could disappear. When she turned back around, Elfman was no longer where she left him. She heard Fairy Hill's door close. Good. She started for the street; one foot after the other sank into saturated grass. By the time she got to the road's gravel soft shoulder, she was like Elfman, totally soaked through, her feet in her ankle boots, her jeans, her tank top. It was a little cold. Cana lifted her umbrella again and considered her destination. Coffin Ridge? She didn't want to know if Juvia still lingered there, waiting for her to show up. The theater? It was a spot that she and Elfman shared and she was afraid of hearing, _'I love you_ ,' in her head again and again, especially if there was no one there to distract her.

Where else was there to go in this shitty town?

_Why do you have to stay here, to begin with?_

The thought hit with startling clarity. What was holding her in Magnolia? Her years' stint at Fairy Hills was coming to an end, Mira was moving on, Cana was a coward. So... why was she there?

She whipped around on her heel and stuck her thumb out. A truck whizzed by and almost took her arm with it. The driver didn't slow. Then next car honked at her for too long, Cana flipped them off. The next four didn't acknowledge her at all, like the first. Cana was annoyed but resolved. The next time lights crested the hill, she stepped out in front of the truck and stood her ground. The person was driving carefully enough that they saw her and eased out into the middle of the road, slowing.

Cana half expected the old Chevy Sierra to keep rolling by but it halted jerkily. She opened the squealing passenger's door and peeked inside. The dome light ignited everything from fast food garbage to cigarette wrappers and the occasional piece of clothing—a sock, a sweater. The guy behind the wheel was her age or a couple years older. His blue eyes were red-rimmed and judging by the smell in the truck, it wasn't because he was a sad boy. Cana smiled. "Hey."

He didn't return her grin. In fact, he was a little bit twitchy. A paranoid high. Great. "Where are you headed?"

He was also the only one that bothered to stop. "Anywhere," Cana said.

"I'm on my way to the Patch."

Magnolia's assisted housing—colloquially known as the Patch. Of _course,_ he was. Cana tapped the truck's rusty frame. "You know what? Never mind." She closed the door and after a moment, the truck started to roll away again. Another car was already coming over the hill. Cana turned her back on it and dug out the bottle of Jimmy Beam she'd convinced some poor old sod to buy for her at the liquor store. She didn't just sip it now, she slugged it back and waited for her head to spin more.

It was already whirling at top-speed.

It took Cana a long time to realize that the car hadn't passed her and that its lights were illuminating her way. She looked back over her shoulder and saw that she recognized the Crown Vic. She groaned aloud and walked faster. The car sped up beside her and the window rolled down.

"Hey there, Cana."

"Go away."

Did he listen? "I got a couple of complaints tonight about a drunk girl stumbling around into traffic on Route Seven. Know anything about that?"

"Should I?"

He'd finished all the games he was willing to play. "Get in."

She peered through the window and saw that despite the cruiser, he'd changed out of his police uniform. "You're not even on duty. You can't boss me around."

"I don't think anyone can boss you around. Just please, get in before Mister Dreyar hears about this and—"

"Oh. What a threat." She waved him off. "Who cares? I'm out of Fairy Hills in two days anyway."

"That's still two days you could spend with your friends before you make the big move."

She scoffed more, though she didn't know which was funnier: his assumption that she had a load of friends or the 'big move'. The Patch was two kilometers from Fairy Hills, though on the rough side of town. "If you haven't noticed, I'm hitching _out of this city_ ," she said as clearly as she could manage. "Now fuck off."

He adopted his Police Man's Voice and said, "Get in the car, Cana."

"No. I'm not going back to Fairy Hills." She felt like a brat and almost stomped her foot, too. She wasn't too drunk to be prideful and refrained.

"Now."

"I told you to fuck off."

"I'm going to keep driving beside you, telling everyone that even thinks about stopping that you're trouble with a capital T. Get in the fucking car."

She squinted at him hard. "Are you _allowed_ to swear at me?"

He quirked his mouth thoughtfully— _sarcastically._ "I just did."

Cana walked faster. He sped the car up to match her, protecting her from passing traffic with his red and blue lights on and obliterating every chance she had at hitchhiking. Cana tried anyway, sticking her thumb out at every passing car. No luck.

They went on like that for half a kilometer before Cana got so frustrated, she screamed. "Seriously!"

"Seriously." He was so unapologetic. "Just get in."

She made a fist and imagined hitting him before opening the car's door and dropping herself inside.

"Thank you."

"Fuck off."

He drove instead.


	6. Chapter 6

When your heart is hollow, another pill to swallow.

* * *

They pulled the cruiser through the drive-thru for cheeseburgers, which were gotten for free with a police officer's discount. After Cana put in her order and he paid, she was more than happy to let silence mingle between them. Constable Clive? He could give her lessons in stoic silences. She was the first to cave, saying around a fry, "You can just drop me off at the bus station."

"No."

"Um. Yes."

"You're not leaving town tonight, Cana."

"Oh no? I beg to differ."

"You can beg all you like but it's not going to happen."

And now he was pissing her off. "Really? Because as soon as you bring me back to Fairy Hills, I'm packing my bag and I'm getting the fuck out of there."

"You assume that's where you're going."

"Is that a threat? I think I feel uncomfortable in this car. Pull over."

His brow came down. "You know it wasn't a threat, Cana. I was suggesting you spend some time in your favourite cell again."

Cana called his bluff. "Yeah. If you were planning on doing that we wouldn't have stopped for cheeseburgers. You can pull over now, I'd like to get this show on the road."

"Wait until the morning."

"No, thanks."

He took his eyes off the road so he could stare long and hard at her. The only thing he was missing was a pair of tinted aviators to make him look like the quintessential cop. It was too dark for sunglasses, though. "Why would you take the bus when I thought you had a bike you loved?"

"Drunk driving is illegal."

"Sure it is, but are you just going to leave it? Stick around until the morning, Cana, when you can take what's important to you."

"That's your big play to make me stay in Magnolia? My bike?" Cana asked waspishly.

"I used to have a bike and I would _never_ have left it behind for anything."

"That's you, not me."

"From what I've heard, you love that thing."

Cana fought several vicious urges—to denounce him and anything they had in common, to pump him for more information. What kind of bike was it? How long did he have it for? Why did he get rid of it? She said, "You can ship it to me."

He looked back at the road and made a left. "What am I supposed to do with you, Cana?"

"Stop and let me back out on the street?" she suggested.

"So some hotshot with his dick in his hand can pick you up?"

"I can handle myself." He shook his head, which made Cana _furious_. "I _can_. I'm not a damsel in distress," she said hotly.

"You look like you're in a lot of fucking distress to me."

"Pull over."

"Not unless we're going to Fairy Hills."

"I am _not,_ " Cana replied.

"Then what's your game plan? Busses don't even run this late."

He had her there. "I had one offer for a ride, I can get another," she said.

"How does Makarov handle you?"

"He's learned to shut the fuck up and let me do me."

"I doubt that," he muttered.

"Where are we going?" Cana asked when they passed by the road for Fairy Hills. She had her hand on the door handle like she was going to throw it open and tuck and roll at sixty kilometers.

His knuckles flexed on the steering wheel as he thought over what he was about to say. "If you don't want to go back to Fairy Hills, I have a Bunkie. You can crash in it until tomorrow."

"A Bunkie. Are you fucking with me right now?"

He glanced at her quickly. "Sheets are clean, just laundered. No one'll bug you. Sleep on it, Cana. If tomorrow comes and you want to hop towns, I'll drop you off at the bus station myself."

"You're serious?"

"As a heart attack. What do you say?"

Curiosity rather than sense made her agree.

* * *

Bunkie was a gentle term for the small shack hanging out in the back of Constable Clive's unkempt property. Cana looked at it with an upturned nose.

"What?"

"Are there raccoons living in that thing?"

"Definitely not."

Cana wasn't so sure. Her benefactor stepped out of the cruiser with his keys in hand and used the car's lights to guide his footsteps up the worn gravel path. A hound dog howled from inside the main house, alerted to their presence. "Shush, Rosie." The dog, surprisingly, quieted. He knocked on the Bunkie door before opening it and Cana's nose curled further.

"Why are you knocking?"

"Just checking."

"For raccoons?"

"For skunks," he said blandly. Cana didn't know if he was kidding or not. The door opened and he flicked on the light beside the door jam, taking the Bunkie's secrets away. It was as small as Cana feared, though there were a double bed, a nightstand, and a bathroom in the left-hand corner and everything was as the good Constable claimed. Tidy, clean. It even smelled nice.

"The secret life of Constable Clive. He's a housekeeper."

"I _have_ a housekeeper. Eh… well, not really. It's complicated," he finished.

Cana raised a brow. He didn't elaborate. "Alright."

"Bathroom's there, there's a cup on the sink for drinking. If you need anything else, just come knock on the door. I'm a light sleeper, Rosie is even worse." His meaning was clear: it was going to be difficult to sneak out. Cana was too tired now anyway. All she wanted to do was crawl onto that bed that looked more comfortable than any her mother had ever been able to afford and was far superior to anything the boarding house had and just pass out. And not think about a day when it could be hers. Or what it would be like if it _were_.

"Alright, kid?"

Cana cleared what had been a dreamy and pained expression. "Yeah."

He nodded. "Okay. G'night." He seemed eager to leave, his generosity at odds with _should I be doing this_. Cana closed the door after him and locked it for good measure. She turned the light off next and twitched aside the drapes over the front window. From there she could watch Constable Clive go to his cruiser. His phone was in hand and pressed against his ear. She heard just the beginning of his conversation. "She's here. Yeah, into the sauce again. Nah, she's okay here for now; I'll get her home in the morning." He ducked his head into the car and Cana let the curtain fall again. The headlights cut out and she was alone. She used her phone as a flashlight and saw that Mira had texted her twice. _Where are you? Hello?!_ Cana found her way to the washroom and then turned the phone off.

* * *

At first, when Cana was woken by a sound at the door, she thought to go down swinging. The door came open, though, and the doorway was filled by someone with hair as pink and bright as summer's sunsets and she realized that it wasn't a skunk coming to do bad things to her but a guy. One she knew in passing, he'd been in the same graduating class as her but had dropped out final semester due to some family drama or another.

It took him some time to realize that he wasn't alone in the Bunkie—like thirty long seconds, in which he came in, head down, closed the door and shed his leather jacket and started on the beaten work boots, too. That was when he noticed that his shoes weren't the only ones by the door, Cana's ankle boots were tipped over and still damp on the _Welcome_ mat. He lifted his gaze, saw her in bed, and checked around the room as if confirming he was where he was supposed to be.

"Hi."

"Hey," Cana said. Her mouth tasted like whisky. When she noticed how unpleasant that was, she noticed how much she had to pee, too, and how cottony her head was.

"Uh..."

"I just… I crashed here last night," Cana said vaguely. Constable too-good-for-his-own-good could have bothered telling her that she'd have a visitor. "I'll get out of your way."

"It's okay. I was just…" He trailed off. Cana really looked at him. There was a lighter in his hand and a glass pipe stained dark brown at the end where it bulbed out sticking out of his pants pocket.

"You were?"

"I don't know what I was doing," he said after a moment and put the lighter away. He dug his hands into his hair. He looked to be an even bigger mess than she was and there was nothing Cana Alberona loved more than messes.


	7. Chapter 7

Here I am, a rabbit-hearted girl

* * *

Back in the time _before,_ when her mother had been alive she'd worked hard and Cana hadn't wanted for anything important—shoes, a helmet for her bike, school supplies, and healthy food, she had it all—but that meant that there were compromises. Housing was the first thing to get cut back. Cana had seen it all. Rats in the walls, cockroaches, biker gangs living in the apartments below, the men coming to harass her mother when the moon got high in the sky. Drugs and drunks and dicks when the three collided.

Cana considered herself well prepared when Mister Dreyar told her she'd be sent to the Patch.

Her new home was tiny. It smelled a little (lot) like cat pee. (Cana had pin-pointed the source to a closet in the bathroom where someone had laid gross burgundy carpet. Who put carpet in a bathroom? Who let a cat pee on it? The great mysteries of life.) It was painted a sickly shade of lilac and not everywhere at that—someone had put a fist or two through the drywall and the owners hadn't bothered to repaint. Probably because they figured that the next tenant would repeat the mistakes of the past. They wouldn't be _wrong._ The carpeting beneath her feet leading up a set of narrow stairs was stained, though it smelled steam cleaned, and her bedroom, one of two, was small and painted white. The single mattress she had to fit in there—a gift from an anonymous benefactor, if Mister Dreyar was to be believed—had to be squished between the north and south walls.

The owner of the building called it cozy. Cana called it claustrophobic. Mira, when she saw the room and the small window that looked out over a cracked parking lot and Cana's bike parked in her parking space below, said that it was cute.

Cana wanted to throttle her.

She didn't. Who else was going to help her lug her belongings out of Fairy Hills and into her new place?

She came back down the squeaking stairs when she heard the door bang open below and wished that she hadn't at all. Elfman waited in the doorway, holding a nightstand.

"Where do you want this?" he asked.

She almost told him to drop it right where he stood and to get out. Her mouth was a traitor. "This way." Cana turned her back on him and it was with a hint of relief, though now she knew that he watched her and that she was bringing him someplace small and intimate when they hadn't even really spoken to each other since the theater night. The day before she moved out didn't count, she'd been too drunk then to string a proper sentence together. She wished a little bit for that crutch now.

At the top of the stairs, she went left and then left again into her bedroom and immediately went for the purple water bottle she kept for emergencies. Elfman watched her drink from it. She didn't have many secrets from him, he knew what was in the bottle and he likely even knew why she was drinking.

"Where do you want it?"

"There by the bed is good," Cana replied and Elfman did her bidding.

"Your room at Fairy Hills is pretty much cleared out," he said as he stood and wiped off his hands. "There's a display case and that's all. Mira's gone to get it."

Cana dropped herself down on her bed; it felt more comfortable somehow. "Thanks."

He shrugged. "I didn't do much."

Not really, did he, helpful Elfman? "Where were you?"

"Out," he said vaguely when he could have just as easily told her to fuck off.

"With that girl from the other night?"

"Ultear."

Cana was curious despite herself. "She's the new catch, huh?"

"Not really."

Cana couldn't stop her mouth from running. "Really? Because you seemed cozy the other night."

Elfman was never great at cutting to the bone before; he was an expert now. "And you and Mister Conbolt?"

"He's a pervert. I wanted to see how much of one."

"And me?"

Cana's stomach pitched with nervousness. "We were only fucking, Elfman. That's all."

He looked like he wanted to fight again. Cana waited for his wrath. He came to her bed and she looked up the line of his body. It was the same as it always was, he intimidated her and turned her on all at once. It was a sickness. "I see that now."

"You don't still think you love me?"

"I think I fucking hate you."

Did she believe him? The scowl on his face seemed genuine enough. It made her feel kind of hollow in the best way. "That's better than love."

"Sometimes, Cana…"

"Sometimes what?"

"You're so fucked up."

"You were happy enough to come along for the ride," she shot back. "You still are, I bet."

"Yeah, when you're fucking guys twice your age? Gross."

Cana leaned back and held out her arms. "And yet, here you are. Just admit you still want me and stop being fucking pathetic." It was all she could do to hold onto the power she once had on him.

He trapped her face between his large palms and tipped her head back far enough that she was forced to look into his eyes. There was a lot of fury there. This was the same Elfman that had been in so many bar fights, Cana was amazed he hadn't been thrown in jail yet. All of the constables down at the MPD were soft. How far would their generosity travel, though? Maybe when Elfman started punching out people that didn't deserve it or he started going too far. For now, though, he was free to run amuck as long as no one got hurt too badly. How fucked up was that? Other people didn't get those kinds of concessions. Other people didn't have their baby sisters killed before their eyes, though.

"Go ahead," Cana challenged.

Elfman gave her the bitterest kiss she'd ever received. Cana didn't know how hungry she was for it until his mouth was on hers and she was taking all of his frustration and pain and swallowing it back like some kind of monster. He moved his hands down her body and grabbed her so hard, she'd have marks. He bit her lip and knotted his fingers in her hair. Cana anticipated what was coming next; they'd done this enough. She pulled her shirt up. Elfman's breath caught and he filled his hands. He was so easy, Cana thought, the things he wanted out of life plain enough. He wanted to get drunk, he wanted to fight and then fuck his frustrations away. They _worked_ when he didn't get stuck on love.

Elfman's kiss slowed. Then he stood and pushed her aside like she was nothing at all.

Undeterred, Cana grabbed his cock and rubbed. She'd missed that, how thick he was, how hard he got, the long length for her hand to travel. She hadn't had anyone else like him before. He could fill her up. She wanted that, too. She lifted her eyes and expected to see him tearing off his shirt or gearing up to close the door, but Elfman, he looked down at her with disgust, though his cock was hard, and wiped his hand over his mouth.

Cana's first mistake was asking, "What's wrong?"

Elfman endeavoured to hurt her; he'd gotten quite good at that, too. "I don't have enough condoms to put it in you."

It took a few seconds for his words to register. Elfman wasn't usually so cruel. Least of all to her. "Get the fuck out."

He left. Cana felt an unwelcomed sting behind her eyes. Her chirping phone was distraction enough to allow her to overcome the annoying reaction. She checked and saw that Natsu had texted her.

_Free tonight?_

She got back to him immediately and didn't even care how desperate it made her seem. _Yes._

He responded just as quickly. _Meet me at the quarry at nine._

_I'll be there._


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter got away from me. It's a lot of mature, just so you're aware. Thanks for reading.

Sickness was fixing me some.

Coughed out my heart in the last stall.

Now that the damage is done, I never miss it at all.

* * *

Starlight fell from the sky against the lake water and glittered like diamonds, their light transcendental. Cana had never seen anything so pure, untouched by the glow of the city. For others, it may have been romantic; for Cana, it helped her see to roll the joint she was working on. Her companion was a little dreamier, high on something much stronger and half-there.

"That one's a satellite. See it blinking different colours?"

"Mm," Cana murmured.

He moved his finger to another quadrant. "That one there is a star named Proxima Centauri. It's a red dwarf."

Cana ran her tongue down the thin paper, wetting it. "Yeah."

"It's the heart of the closest solar system to ours, though it's still four thousand, two hundred and forty-three lightyears away. The light we're seeing now is from the past. That star could be dead by now," Natsu said. "That's how long it takes for it to get to Earth." He lifted his hand and tried to touch a star. Of course, he couldn't, stars were for dreamers and for Gods, not for losts.

"How do you know so much about the stars?" Cana asked finally.

Natsu shrugged, his bare and damp shoulder nudging her leg. "Just do."

His words didn't ring absolutely true. Cana, who'd told enough lies to identify one, knew that Natsu was glazing over an important detail. "Were your parents big into astronomy?" She didn't know why she didn't let him have peace, she already knew more of his secrets than he knew of hers, but she was curious.

"Nah."

"Then what?"

"Gildarts has a telescope," he said vaguely. "I used to use it with a girl I knew."

He was just a little _too_ vague. "A girl you were in love with?"

"I don't know. Maybe."

Cana never wanted to talk about love, yet there was something interesting in Natsu's longing. "You don't talk to her anymore?"

"Not really, just sometimes," he said.

"Why only sometimes?"

He tipped his head back and looked at her through his messy, pink hair. "She's in law school."

Like that answered everything. And it kind of did. Cana put her joint behind her ear. "And you're out here."

"Yeah."

She deigned to change the subject and not only feed her own curiosity but pull Natsu out of his funk. "Why were you at Clive's Bunkie the other day? What is it with you guys?"

Her attempt backfired badly when Natsu said drolly, "He told me to show up if I needed to."

"Needed to?"

He shrugged again. "Sometimes, things get kind of real at home. He lets me stay in his place when that happens."

"You're the housekeeper?"

"Eh? Nah. That's Lucy when she comes to visit."

"Lucy." Cana connected the dots easily enough just by listening to him say her name. "Law School."

"Yeah, Law School."

"Sounds like she still wants to see you."

"It doesn't work."

Cana knew all about _it doesn't work._ "She's too good for you?"

He huffed and tangled his fingers in his hair. "Are you going to light that thing or what?"

Cana took the joint from behind her ear and sparked it up. She smoked half and gave the rest to him. He killed the rest and when he was done, he didn't want to laugh or stare at the sky anymore, he wanted to forget about Law School Lucy and the best way to do that was to throw down with Assisted Housing Cana, who wasn't too good for him. He pulled her into his lap and Cana embraced her role because Natsu played one, too. The crutch. The connection with a life she'd only dreamed of tasting. He was closer to Gildarts than she'd ever been and she was grossly fascinated. And sickly irritated. How could she be so interested and so full of loathing? She didn't know. She took it out on him, though, kissing him too hard, grabbing him too roughly. Natsu was good for it. Wanted it, really, that's what the sharp intakes of breath meant and the furrowed brow, that's what it meant when Cana bit him hard on the shoulder by his tattoo and he arched his hips into her. that's what it meant when she in turn bit his ribs, too, and he pushed her down all the way to the junction of his legs.

The shorts he was in were still soaked from swimming. Cana undid them and peeled them all the way off with great anticipation. He came out, thick and slightly curved and hard. She felt the thoughts drugs and alcohol couldn't take away melt into the background. This was what she needed. She took her time to milk the reprieve for all it was worth, spreading Natsu's legs and placing her tongue way down low beneath his testicles. He knotted his fingers in her hair and held her there for a moment, swearing, and then he tipped his hips and brought her up. There was almost no patience to him ever. Cana thought she liked it. He pushed her down on his cock while he sat up and yanked on the underwear she'd gone swimming in. They were around her thighs when he started grabbing her ass hard enough to leave finger marks.

His hand disappeared. She looked up and saw that his middle finger was in his mouth. When he brought it back out again, it was slicked with spit. He grabbed Cana once more and didn't ask permission to finger her asshole. Cana came off his cock when he entered to spit out, "What the fuck?"

Natsu asked, "Do you want me to stop?"

After hearing all that heat in his voice? "Keep going." For now, anyway. She wasn't sure if she'd change her mind after.

He grabbed her hair with his free hand and pulled her up enough to mash their mouths together. His finger entered deeper and she forgot to be wary. She kissed him back until he wanted her mouth back on his cock and pushed her back between his legs again. He was twice as hard now than he was before. A thrill moved through Cana's body, starting at her chest and terminating between her legs. She reached down and found herself soaked and sensitive. She massaged her clit and knew it wouldn't be long. She focused on her own fingers and let Natsu arch into her mouth. He didn't seem to care that sometimes, her teeth got in the way, in fact, it seemed the sloppier the better.

His hip thrusts got faster when Cana's breathing got heavier the closer to orgasm she came. He started swelling in her mouth and swearing. And that was all the encouragement Cana needed. The orgasm took her by force, one of the strongest, if not the strongest, she'd ever had. She moaned and it had nowhere to go but into Natsu's cock. He panted heavily above her; she half expected him to come but he held off.

When she was done squirming, Natsu removed his finger and pulled her up and kissed her again. Cana let it happen, anticipating what came next as Natsu rummaged around for a condom in his wallet. He put it on expertly and Cana imagined that like Natsu, she was a notch in a long line of notches he etched to forget about Law School Lucy. She was okay with that. She discarded her underwear in anticipation; they got lost somewhere in the shadows at the lakeside.

On top was one of her favourite places to be, Natsu had been quick to pick that up after their first encounter, and it's where he positioned her now with his hands digging into her hips. She fit overtop of him and it wasn't perfectly and it wasn't easily, either, they were both too high for coordination, but that in itself was perfect, in a way. Cana rode him until she was sweaty and let her cries sing through the quarry, echoing off shield rock and water, swallowed by trees.

* * *

Cana pressed her cheek into the cool glass of Natsu's rusted old Dakota and watched the nighttime whirl by. He weaved slightly as he drove and he drove slowly, telling her what she already knew: he wasn't really okay to drive.

"How long have you known him for?"

"Hm?" Natsu asked distractedly.

"Gildarts. How long have you known him for?"

"Since I was a kid," Natsu said. "He used to live on the same street as me."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Me and Zeref would sneak into his backyard and play with his old dog, Scrappy." His mouth quirked. "When Scrappy kicked the bucket, Zeref and I were pretty crushed." Cana didn't _want_ to hear the rest of the story—it seemed personal and intimate—but she couldn't, for the life of her, tell him to stop. "He called us over one day and when we got into his backyard, there was this puppy. He told us to give her a name."

"Rosie," Cana suggested.

"Yeah."

She was all at once wickedly jealous and feeling more than a little mean. "That's kind of a dumb name."

Natsu said, "I was seven."

"Still. I can't believe he kept it."

"Gildarts is alright."

His lackadaisical attitude only made her angrier. She dug her fingers into her kneecap, thinking of things she could say to make him hurt. Before she could get anything out, he asked her, "Are you busy tomorrow?"

So he could forget Law School Lucy and Cana could again scratch at the periphery of something sick and delusional. She didn't know which of them was going to ache when this ride stopped spinning, but she knew it was going to be one or the other.

"We can hang out."


	9. Chapter 9

See, when it starts to fall apart  
Man, it really falls apart  
Like boots or hearts, oh when they start  
They really fall apart

* * *

It took three weeks to see where Natsu lived. Three weeks of clandestine fucking by the lake, three weeks of getting drunk, getting high, then getting obliterated. Three weeks of learning how Lucy was the best thing to ever walk into his life. Three weeks of learning how he walked away from her. Three weeks of some of the best sex she'd ever had. Three weeks of wildness, uncontrollable _wildness._ Three weeks of getting lost in a maze she was already stumbling through.

Natsu was bad for her.

As bad for her as alcohol.

As bad for her as drugs.

Bad.

B.

A.

D.

She loved it. And she hated it. The mornings she'd wake up so hungover, she couldn't see. The night's she'd spend with her ears bleeding _Lucy Heartfilia._ Law School Lucy. Stars in the Sky Lucy. Beautiful, Wonderful, Lucy. Cana let it go on because when he was talking about Lucy, he was also talking about Gildarts and she lapped that up, ashamedly. No one knew but her, though, how desperately she filed the information away.

The night he brought her to his home was the same night she tried his Black Pearl.

They raced through town in Natsu's little Dakota truck. It had a modified muffler, loud and obnoxious. That wasn't a surprise. He drove it too fast. That wasn't a surprise, either. He drove with classic rock blaring out of his system, The Rolling Stone's _Sympathy for the Devil,_ which was perhaps the most original thing he could do _._

He didn't look at Cana, his eyes fixed on the road, steering one-handed, the other in his messy pink hair. She watched him as the lights flicked through the window. He looked more troubled than usual and indeed, had been checking his phone too much in between puffs off a cigarette in front of her apartment. If he thought she wouldn't see his face screw up in the light of his cracked phone screen, he was wrong. Cana never asked what was going on, though, because she didn't think she could carry his shit, too. She was just there for the ride.

He sat in front of a stoplight for too long after a car had passed. "Are you going to take that?" Cana nudged.

Natsu jarred and slammed his foot down on the gas. The truck fishtailed around the corner and a small brick of something rolled out of his pocket and hit against Cana's hip. She picked it up and rolled it between her hands. "What's this?"

Natsu snatched it back from her. "Nothing."

Cana took it back again and opened it. The smell of vinegar filled the truck. "This is that Pearl stuff you're always smoking, isn't it?"

His cheekbone got sharp. "Don't wave it around, anyone could be watching."

No, they couldn't. "Are you going to smoke some?"

His chest expanded. "I don't know."

"I want to try." Her heart pounded after the words were out.

His eyes came her way. "You do?"

She shrugged. "Why not? And I'd rather try with you than some creep."

"I don't have a pipe."

Cana pulled out hers. "Is this good enough?"

His breath came out. "Yeah."

"Good." She started googling how to do it. Natsu slowed the truck when they got to a part of town known as the Point and made a left at a four-way stop sign. The turn brought them into a part of Magnolia that was an odd mix of family abodes—middle-class suburbia—and poverty.

On one side of the road, the houses looked out over the lake, tall, their fences in good repair, made of solid two-by-fours stained in natural cedar colour. In the driveways sat things like Santa Fes and Outbacks. The other side of the road were things that Cana was more comfortable with. Squat homes with unkempt grass. Beat up Cavaliers, Sunfires, a Mazda or two.

He pulled behind a closed up movie store and got out.

They smoked it on his tailgate. Cana's head was spinning, colours bleeding into colours. She'd never had a high like that before. She thought she should be afraid of it. The only thing she was, was without her inhibitions.

When they were through, Natsu took her by the elbow and guided her off the tailgate. She teetered on the sidewalk and looked at their destination. There were lights on inside the movie store, though each window was blocked by a blanket or towel. Music came from the inside, more classic rock, this time Led Zeppelin's _Black Dog._

Natsu opened the glass and wood door with a key that he produced from his pocket and ushered Cana inside. The place was thick with pot and cigarette smoke. Cana breathed shallowly once she was over the threshold. White tiled floor that had recently been swept was beneath her feet, and under her hand was drywall. From what she could remember, the movie store looked almost exactly as it had when it was a business and not being rented out as an—Cana _assumed_ —illegal apartment. The only things missing were the rows upon rows of movies. The walls were plain white, though there were band posters hanging around, and almost every surface was filled with a body. Most lounged casually. Some laughed, some spoke with their heads together. More than a few were drinking, some took hits off a bong, others a pipe. Two girls disappeared down a hallway at the far end and Cana heard a door close.

A man a few years older than Cana looked up from the ratty grey couch along the far wall and focused on Natsu. Their hair was different—Natsu's bleached and then dyed pink, the man's blacker than midnight, but their resemblance was uncanny. He pushed back the girl that had been hanging off his shoulder, another black-haired beautiful that Cana recognized from the night she saw Elfman on Fairy Hills' porch, and rose.

His eyes weren't glassy like the others and his voice, when he was close enough to speak to Natsu, was collected and calm. "Who's this?"

"Cana," Natsu introduced. "This is my brother, Zeref."

"Hey." He focused on Natsu again. "You got a phone call while you were out."

"I know," Natsu said. "I got the message." His tone left very little room for further inquiry.

"Alright." Zeref stepped back. "You want a beer, Cana?"

She was spinning too badly to say no.

"I got it," Natsu said and disappeared. Zeref left Cana's side and went back to the couch. The girl—Ultear, Cana finally remembered—tried to engage him again. He didn't look interested and she looked furious for it.

Natsu returned with a Coors. Cheap. Domestic. Cana didn't care. She took the beer and let Natsu take her through the apartment. In the center room, a few people called a greeting to Natsu and he muttered something intelligible back. They didn't sit down with the rest of the crowd, they continued into the hallway where the two girls disappeared and went in the same direction. At the end of the dark and plain corridor was a door that was closed.

"Washroom," Natsu told Cana. They went for the door next to it, the one with a Stones poster taped to it. Inside was more of the same, band posters, a dragon statue here and there, a small cot, clothes everywhere. Natsu closed the door and Cana helped herself to the bed, the only place to sit.

Cana found her tongue. "You live in a movie store."

"Yeah." Natsu started removing stuff from his pocket, wallet, keys, phone, drugs. It all went on a beat up baby blue dresser and stayed there.

"How?"

"Zeref knows the owner."

Cana flopped back on the bed with her arms wide. Her beer just barely stayed upright in her hand. She didn't notice, mind elsewhere. Even the stuccoed ceiling had band posters on it. She studied Pink Floyd's _The Wall_ by the glow of a black bedside lamp. Natsu's phone buzzing dragged her from a weird place where the bricks on the poster wobbled and migrated. She forgot her _I don't want to be involved in your shit_ and asked, "Who keeps calling you?"

"Gildarts."

She lifted her heavy head and looked at him. He was stripping off his hoody now.

"What's he want?"

"Dunno." Natsu was a liar at worst. An expert avoider at best.

"No?"

"Probably just checking up on me," he said offhandedly. His words weren't meant to sting but they _did._ What was it about Natsu that was so interesting to Gildarts?

Natsu undid his pants and left them loose on his hips before coming to her. Cana looked up the long line of his body. He spent a lot of time lifting. Running, maybe, too. He was pretty in an _I should stay away_ kind of way. Her desire for self-destruction was stronger than her jealousy so when he planted his hands on either side of her body and leaned down, she met his mouth. His kiss was the same as it always was, skilled but rushed but somehow, it felt different today. It was the drugs. The drugs changed everything. The realization made her simultaneously frightened and fascinated. This was where the real danger lay.

Cana didn't remember exactly when Ultear entered the room and barely flinched when hair as dark as raven's feathers fell over Natsu's shoulders and whispered on hers. Words were said. Bodies moved. It took Cana just a second to catch up and realize that the mouth on hers had changed, that now she was tasting lipstick, that now the body on top of hers was soft and not all hard muscle, that the sighs were sighs and not hot and hectic grunts. She opened her eyes and realized that she wasn't through crushing Elfman if indeed, Ultear had been his at all.

"Is this okay?" the girl asked.

Cana was already grabbing her and Ultear, despite asking for permission, was already naked. Time slipped and skipped and disappeared before reappearing again at the oddest moments. Minutes moved by as seconds that Cana counted with tremors elicited by fingers she couldn't see working on her body. Ultear adjusted so her thighs pressed against Cana's cheeks. Cana held her by the hips and felt Natsu get between her legs. He filled her up and alternated his speed frequently, fast, slow, steady.

Time slipped again. Cana moved like a ghost, reversing their positions, aware only of how she felt, holding Ultear's legs, a girl she hadn't even exchanged names with. She kissed Natsu and it was hectic. She moved her hips against Ultear's tongue and it was uncoordinated. She _felt_ it when Natsu orgasmed and that was because he'd pulled out of Ultear and used Cana's mouth instead.

Afterward, Cana leaned back against the bedroom wall and sucked in breath. A drink was pressed into her hand. Water. It touched her lips and she realized how thirsty she was. The glass disappeared again. She watched through heavy-lidded eyes as Natsu dressed, Ultear, too. Cana felt for her own clothes and found her bra. Her underwear, though?

"Here, sweetie." Ultear was there with a thong in her hand.

"Oh." Cana got up and held Natsu's shoulder, using him for balance as she held out her foot. Ultear laughed and obliged, leaning down so Cana could step into them. She brought them up Cana's legs and Cana thought she was the most sensual creature she'd ever met. Maybe she was just high. She kissed Ultear as she stood and would have kept going but Natsu's phone buzzed again. He swore.

"What is it?" Ultear asked around Cana's mouth.

Natsu scrubbed his face. "You gotta get out of here."

Ultear struck Cana as the type of girl that gave very little fucks about much of anything. She left Cana's side for Natsu's and leaned over his shoulder, reading his texts. "Mm. Does that mean Lucy got tired of waiting for you?"

"Clothes, Ultear," Natsu said and put his phone on the dresser. He helped Cana, who felt very much like she needed it, and dressed her like she was a child. Pants, shirt, sweater.

"What do you plan on doing with this one?" Ultear asked.

"Can you take her home?"

Cana realized they were talking about _her_.

"She doesn't look like she knows where she's going."

"The Patch," Natsu said as he opened his bedroom door. Light and sound bled in and Cana became aware for the first time in—how long?—that there was a world beyond Natsu's room. A world filled not just with laughter and smoke but with a girl raising her hand to knock on the door. Blonde. That's what gave it away for Cana, who had trouble stringing a single thought together. Blonde was for Law School Lucy. Lucy looked between Ultear and Cana and then lastly, Natsu. Cana found herself surprised. Her destruction had reached an unexpected victim.

Ultear saved her from an unwanted and sloppy apology by dragging her out.


	10. Chapter 10

I'm sailing away from my heartache on a riverboat fantasy.

* * *

Ultear needed no time to get comfortable in Cana's small home. She lounged on the bed whenever she deigned to come over, which was increasingly often as of late, and managed to look bored and bitchy and beautiful all at once. She kept Cana busy enough that she wasn't looking for a job like she was supposed to be and honestly, she didn't even care. Anxiety? All but gone when Ultear was there.

Ultear's poison wasn't drinking but pills, ones that she sometimes swallowed, sometimes snorted off the only picture Cana dared to keep—her and Mira standing by the locks in town, taken on the same fall day Mira's caller ID was. More than once, she thought of finding some dark hole for the photo, she hadn't heard from Mira in a week or two at least, but she couldn't. Not yet.

Besides, if she did, what else would Ultear have to clean off with a hollow pen?

When she was high, Ultear took off her clothes and demanded Cana's attention. Cana gave it to her unerringly because when she was sober, the most affectionate Ultear got was getting Cana to paint her toes, and that was _good_. She didn't ask questions. She didn't tell Cana, _I think I'm in love with you_ , she didn't use Cana as a crutch to find her worst self, she already knew who that was, and she _definitely_ didn't tell Cana to slow down. In fact, she didn't tell her much of _anything_. It was Cana that had to ask the hard questions, and only after two weeks had passed.

"Have you talked to Natsu?" She wanted it to come out casually while Ultear stood by her mirror, trying on all the different shades of lipstick Cana had in her repertoire. It really wasn't that impressive. Black. Scarlet. Indigo.

"He's been busy. It's reading week."

Cana solved the puzzle. "Lucy." Home from university. "She wasn't pissed about that night?"

"She was mad," Ultear affirmed. "Girls are kind of dumb when they're in love, though, aren't they?"

Cana didn't care for how the declaration made her feel.

Ultear smacked her lips together then came to Cana. All of her movements were both somehow truncated and fluid as she knelt down between Cana's knees and pulled open the lapels of the red plaid shirt Cana had thrown over a low-cut tank. Her lips were warm on the topmost swell of Cana's breast, leaving behind an imprint of deep blue. The closed-mouth kiss was followed by an open one, and then a line of them all the way down Cana's belly to between her legs. Blue lipstick smeared across her shirt. Cana didn't care. It didn't make her think about if she should feel guilty or not. She leaned back to take off her pants but Ultear abruptly stood. "Do you want to go out?"

The only thing she wanted was more of that lipstick on her body. Ultear never led her astray, though. "Out where?"

"A friend of mine lives a couple doors down from you."

"A friend?"

"Actually, sort of my stepbrother," she said vaguely.

"He lives in the Patch?"

"Yea. It's a long story. Are you in?" Ultear returned to the mirror and sloppily fixed her lipstick. With that done, she reached inside her black dress and hiked her breasts up ridiculously high. How did they even stay there? "It'll be fun."

"Sure." Anything to keep the high rolling. Cana got off her bed and found her beat up combats to go on over her tights. She didn't bother doing up the laces, leaving them loose. She ditched the plaid next and pulled on her leather jacket over her tank. By the time she was done, Ultear had pulled on a jean jacket and found her own boots. Unlike Cana, she took the time to do hers up, every silver clasp. She stood again and knotted her fingers with Cana's. On the way out, Cana grabbed her purple water bottle off the dresser.

The air outside of her house had a bite to it. Cana put her hands way into the bottoms of her pockets and watched the ugly world slip on by. There were lots to look at. The Patch was always teeming with people, some smoking on their front stoops, some working on their cars, some watching their children zoom through the narrow and relatively quiet streets on tricycles and scooters, squealing as they played. Every house was the same in some way, the people all sharing one thing in common: the inability to get by without some kind of subsidy. It drove Cana nuts—she didn't _want_ to be like that—but apathy that bordered the acceptance of her situation was a heavier hitter. She was able to keep on walking instead of turning around and retreating into herself. It helped that Ultear's lip marks were still on her skin like a promise of what was to come.

Distraction.

House number one-oh-two was made out of the same brick as Cana's and she recognized the truck in the driveway. That didn't surprise her, the Patch was a relatively small community and since fucking things up for Natsu, she'd been nearly house-bound, too disgusted with herself to go out. She didn't have to when trouble came to her.

Music oozed out of the home's every orifice.

_I'm ripped across the ditch and settled in the dirt and I'm_  
I wear you like a stitch, yet I'm the one who's hurt  
Pay attention to your twisted little indiscretions  
I've got no right to win, I'm just caught up in all the battles

Cana identified Slipknot's _Before I Forget_.

Ultear sighed. The music meant something to her that it didn't to Cana. "He's in a mood," she explained as she tromped up the broken patio stone walkway, heels sinking into the cracks where yellowed grass waited. Her conclusion didn't stop her from knocking loudly on the door. Of course, it wasn't answered, the music was too loud for anyone to hear. Ultear entered without being invited inside and Cana followed.

Aside from the clothes covering many of the surfaces, this unit looked identical to Cana's, right down to the scratched white paint. Ultear navigated the disorganized piles of cotton and helped herself to the living room where she found the huge speaker system and turned the music way down. There came shocking silence, and then a voice.

"What the fuck?" The doorway was filled with pale skin and raven's hair and Cana placed the truck. Maybe she'd seen it driving back and forth through the Patch but it was also the same one that stopped for her the night Gildarts picked her up off the street.

"Hi, Gray." Ultear put herself on the couch and crossed her legs; her smile was thorny.

"You can't just _invite_ yourself in, Ultear." Gray pushed his hand through his wet hair while he looked for a shirt to go with his low slung jeans. He found one on one of his speakers, reading, _Man Machine Poem._ "And you can't just fuck with my music."

"Why? It's garish anyway."

He glowered and addressed Cana. "Who's..." He trailed off and Cana knew he remembered.

"Cana, Gray. Sit, Cana." Ultear reached for her hand. When Cana was seated beside her, she sat forward and addressed Gray. "Tell me about the bee in your bonnet."

"It's nothing." He came to the stout coffee table in the center of the room barefooted and grabbed a package of cigarettes off its surface. Players.

"Bullshit."

"Fuck off, Ultear. What would you know?" He blew out a thick cloud of smoke and dropped the cigarettes back to where they'd come from.

"I lived with you for four years, I know."

Gray huffed and grabbed a bottle of water from a case beside his couch. He had it opened and drained in a moment. The sound of the plastic crunching couldn't cover the noise of his phone buzzing on the table.

Both Ultear and Gray looked at it at the same time. Gray snatched it up before Ultear could.

"Is that girl still messaging you?"

Gray said nothing as he read the screen.

"Gray." Ultear's voice was sharp.

He waved her off. "No. It's fine."

She stood, leaving Cana's side cold, and snatched at his phone. There was a short battle in which Ultear had the advantage, standing. She had his phone in seconds and took a few quick steps away from him. Gray swore and stood but Ultear was already reading his messages.

"You told me you were going to delete this crazy bitch's number. Block her."

Gray reached around her body. "It's complicated."

"No. It's not."

"Do you have Zeref's number off your phone?" Gray asked.

"Zeref doesn't stalk me, nor I him."

Cana watched with slight amusement and slight horror as Ultear did the work for him with a few quick swipes of her finger. "There. Done."

"Seriously?" he asked indignantly.

"Seriously."

He grabbed his phone out of her hand and searched. "You're such a fucking bitch."

Ultear took the phone back and threw it on the couch beside Cana. "Yeah. Now forget about that shit and let's have some fun."

"No. Get—"

Ultear was even bossier with him than she was with Cana. "Shut up. Don't be like that."

His mouth closed but his scowl intensified.

Ultear, manipulative Ultear, pushed him back into his seat and Cana felt real sympathy for him, she knew just what it was like, how hard it was to say no when Ultear was wearing that expression.

"I told Cana we were going to have fun, so let's have fun." Ultear knelt in front of him and went through his coffee table. Gray watched her pull out a pipe, a bag of weed, and a lighter, and whatever despondence and resistance he'd been working on fizzled. Ultear stood like she knew everyone in the room watched her and came back to Cana. She sat between Cana's feet, one foot up, uncaring if her dress was peeped up, and packed her bowl.

* * *

Cana looked down the steep hill to the bottom where the river meandered by, wide and deep and dark, named Black for the colour of the water. Black River. She never thought it ominous before but now, glowing by the light of their fire? It could be. Things lived beneath that surface. Some good. Some bad. Some, she was sure she didn't have names for. They could belong to nightmare. They could grab her feet and drag her down and—

Distantly, she recognized the long dark spiral into a bad trip.

Gray unintentionally obliterated the encroaching fog. "Want some?" He held out a bottle of tequila. He'd smoked two bowls and smashed through a quarter bottle and had forgotten all about the girl on the phone. Ultear helped with that, too, Cana knew, demanding he pass her smoke from his mouth and then kissing him with her eyes closed. Everyone knew she saw someone else as she was doing it. Gray didn't care, nor did Cana. She liked watching Ultear press into him. She liked hearing her moan. She liked watching her hand slide over Gray's dick gently enough it must have driven him crazy and she liked the way Gray groaned back. She liked it most when Ultear would deny him anything else and give her attention instead to Cana.

Cana took the bottle and slugged back a shot. It slid down easily. Ultear was there when the bottle disappeared. It felt like she was always there. Cana wished she had silver hair instead.

Ultear did what Ultear did best and distracted her with a kiss so soft and so sultry, Cana's head emptied. Who cared that it wasn't Mira with her, her partner in crime for as long as she could remember, who cared that they were behind a set of closed department stores, they were on a blanket and that was good enough for Cana.

She stretched out when Ultear asked and watched Gray watching her as Ultear pulled off her boots, her pants and set them both aside. More indigo lipstick was left on Cana's calves, then on her thighs. Her underwear was the next thing to receive that treatment. She could feel Ultear's hot breath through the fabric and thought she was so turned on, she could die. Then Ultear's tongue flicked over the sensitive area and she knew that it got sweeter still. She reached up and Gray was there. He pulled her into his lap, legs on either side of her body, and held her with one arm around her middle while he pulled her underwear aside for Ultear. Her tongue was hot and wet and slick, somehow even more skilled now than before. And Gray. He pulled her shirt up and just the cold air on her breasts was nice. Then he began to touch her. Cana took him by the hair and hauled him down for a long, slow kiss and let herself know bliss for at least a little while.

* * *

The two o'clock moon was bright enough that Cana was just able to see that her door had a note left on it. She waited until she was inside to read it and it took her three times to comprehend. She needed to give an update on her employment status. She'd have visitors' tomorrow. She cursed and looked around her place. It was a mess. Dishes and clothes and general untidiness. Before collapsing into unconsciousness, she tidied as best as she could.


	11. Chapter 11

I wanna break down where your heart gets  
So torn it's almost breaking mine

* * *

_"You were not the successful candidate."_

_"We decided to go another direction."_

_"I'm sorry, Miss Alberona, but your skill set didn't match what we were looking for."_

Cana thought of transcribing all of her rejection calls and making herself a collage. It wouldn't be a very nice one, but maybe it would give her motivation to do something right. The next call she got was from a garage on Fifth that was looking for a bike mechanic. They told her something unsurprising, "You don't have the experience we're looking for."

"I do all my own work," she said just because, not that she thought it'd make a lick of difference.

"I heard your bike when you pulled up."

Cana hung up without telling him to fuck off. She didn't feel like it was a win. She almost cried. Then she breathed out and made herself hard like iron. She dressed to impress the kind of people Macy's targeted and did her makeup, too. She took her shitty sounding bike with its perforated muffler and drove it to one of her favourite parts of town and there, amongst the filth, cigarette butts, broken beer bottles, discarded condom wrappers, she did what she hadn't been able to do all week and got the job she'd teased Mister Conbolt about.

She saw him there in a dingy booth in the back her first shift waiting tables and waved. His lips pursed and he left without getting the lap dance he was likely gunning for; not without looking at her long and hard, though.

* * *

Ultear rubbed black lipstick over her mouth in Cana's mirror and adjusted her Wednesday Addams collar. "How does it look?"

Like something Wednesday never would have worn; it was so short. Cana liked it, though. "Hot," she said as she wrapped a black tie around the braid she worked on for Ultear.

"Good. What are you going to wear?"

Cana waved to herself. It was almost the same thing she always wore, a crop top, her leather jacket, and a pair of jeans tight enough she had to wiggle into them. Ultear pouted. "It's Halloween."

"This is what I got." She had no money, she didn't get paid for another week and most of that had to go toward the rent she was two months behind on. If it didn't, she'd be out of a place to live. Assisted Housing Cana would be _No_ Housing Cana; her support worker was pretty clear.

Ultear sighed dramatically. "Here." She dug into her purse and pulled out a set of fuzzy cat ears. Turning, she put them on Cana's head and adjusted her hair, pulling the curling locks over her shoulders. A look came over her that Cana wasn't totally comfortable with. Ultear seemed to recognize it, too and quashed it well before Cana could. That's what Cana liked about her, she had even less time for love.

"Is Gray coming?"

Ultear spun away from her and brushed blush over her cheeks. "Everyone is."

Cana put on her boots and by the time she was done, Ultear was ready.

* * *

The house belonged to no one. Ancient, it lurched over Magnolia's farm country, a sinister personality all of its own. At the end of its driveway was a single streetlamp that almost made it seem welcoming, but a look up the long, gravel shot to the house's crooked and boarded up windows said otherwise.

Cana took her motorcycle up the driveway slowly, passing by pumpkins and balloons, some saying, ' _We all float down here_ ', others, ' _I love Derry_!' Someone had made scarecrows; not all of them moved but some. One twitched near her and Cana both smiled and felt her heart pick up speed. In the seat behind her, Ultear laughed and waggled her fingers at one that staggered dangerously close to the driveway. "Hi, Zeref." She got no response. When they were far enough past, Cana asked,

"Natsu's brother?" He seemed too serious to fill a role like that.

"Natsu convinced him to dress up."

Cana could see it; Natsu had a great capacity to convince anyone of almost anything. All he had to do was share that winning smile.

Music throbbed, conflicting songs, In This Moment's _Big Bad Wolf_ coming from a sagging barn ignited from the inside with what could have only been fire, for what else swayed and flitted so erratically, and Taylor Swift's _Look What You Made Me Do,_ coming from the house at the other end of the property. There were people outside of both, dancing, though Cana couldn't tell which song they were dancing to. Almost everyone was in costume, though she picked Gray out of the crowd, dressed in a suit that looked too large for him and a pair of gold-framed glasses without the glass inside.

"Gawd, Lars Thorwald," Ultear moaned. "He's such a geek. Do you know how many times he forced me to watch Rear Window when we lived together?"

"What?"

"Alfred Hitchcock? Rear Window? No?" She sighed dramatically. "Count yourself lucky, I suppose. It's just some old movie he likes."

Frankly, Cana didn't want to know what Gray loved and didn't ask any more important questions. She stopped her bike by the barn between a rusty Civic and a familiar looking Dakota. Ultear got off first and said, "I got us a surprise. Close your eyes and open your mouth."

Cana did what she was told but peeped through her lashes. Ultear dug around in her bra and pulled out a small yellow pill stenciled with a star. Cana closed her mouth and opened her eyes completely. "What is it?"

Ultear looked disappointed but was forward. "Molly."

Cana shook her head. "I've never—"

"It'll be fun."

"I don't even know what it is," Cana protested.

"Ecstasy. Basically."

Ecstasy. Cana's stomach plunged. Ultear saw the expression on her face and laughed softly. "Honestly, Cana, it's not a big deal."

Said her.

"Relax. It'll be the best thing you ever do, I promise. Everything feels better after. This." Ultear's fingers slid along Cana's leg to the junction in between. "This." Her lips were warm and moist. "This." She grabbed Cana forcefully, filling both her hands. Ultear knew Cana well enough to know that she was sold. She leaned back and whispered, "I'll go first."

Cana watched in fascination as Ultear opened her mouth and put out her cough drop coloured tongue; the yellow pill looked bright against the red. She took it back and swallowed without water. When she came for Cana again, Cana opened. The pill tasted like chalk and got stuck in her throat. She choked it back with a couple hits off her water bottle; the vodka inside burned all the way down in the best way.

The high didn't hit immediately. In fact, it took so long that Cana thought it wouldn't come at all. She spent the time drinking and wandering between people cluttered on a lawn too long between cuts, dragged behind Ultear as she prowled through the crowd. When Cana asked why, she said it was because there were people she wanted to talk to; really, she was looking for Zeref. He couldn't stay out in the driveway all night, right?

Elfman stepped out of the barn and drifted toward them, hesitating only when he saw Cana. His shoulders squared and he closed the rest of the distance. "Hey."

Ultear's smile came as easy for Elfman as it did for Cana. "Hey, Elf."

Elfman didn't dawdle. "Did you talk to him?"

"Yeah, I did." She lifted up her dress and pulled a piece of paper out of her garter. She tucked it into Elfman's hand with a flirtatious smile and pulled him down so they were inches apart. "Want some Molly with us?"

Elfman adjusted his attention, looking Cana's way. _I think I love you_. Cana looked away and heard him say, "I'll pass."

"Find me if you change your mind." Ultear patted his chest and Elfman walked away.

"What was that about?"

"My mom's ex is a cop. Elfman wanted to talk to him."

"About?"

Ultear shrugged. Cana found the movement maddeningly airy. "Dunno."

"He wouldn't ask for no reason."

Ultear didn't respond, she'd spotted raven's black in the crowd. She let go of Cana's hand and floated away. Where her hand had been tingled; it was a sensation that moved through every part of Cana's body. That was the Molly. Finally.

Cana started to follow Ultear but got sidetracked by a girl that had put herself in a Daenerys costume. Mira. "Hey."

It had been weeks. Cana couldn't find it in herself to be mad just then. She wrapped her arm around Mira's waist and pulled her into her side. "Hey, Mira. I missed you."

"Missed you, too." Mira kissed her cheek and then cut to the chase. "I heard you got a job at Macy's."

First Cana's chest felt heavy and then her stomach and her legs. The sensation moved, an undulating conveyer belt, moving up and down her body. She needed to sit. "Yea."

"Are you alright?"

Cana didn't think Mira was asking because she was folding her legs and putting herself down on the ground. Despite the nice dress she was wearing, Cana pulled Mira down, too. "I'm fine."

Mira settled and locked Cana's eyes in her own. "How is it there? At Macy's?"

"Alright. Mister Conbolt showed up." She was thirsty and drank most of her water bottle in one go. She would have finished it but Mira took it away from her, setting it down on the ground by her side.

"Awkward."

"I still think he wants to fuck me."

"He's weird with you for sure. You should probably just work until you find something better and then get out of there—"

Cana cut in. "Why would I bother leaving? It's a good gig."

Mira didn't flinch. "You can do better than that trashy place."

Cana laughed humorlessly. "No. Sorry."

"You haven't even tried."

Cana's annoyance came fast and hard. "Fuck off I haven't. It was the only place that would hire me, Mira, and I need a job. It's not like I can walk away."

"I'm not trying to be a bitch; I just know you can do better."

This was the best she had and she had been satisfied. Not just satisfied. Proud of herself for that accomplishment when everything seemed to be fucking up. Until that moment. "You don't know anything." Cana got jaggedly to her feet.

"Where are you going?" Mira asked.

Cana found a way to thrust herself into the crowd and used the mass of bodies to disappear. She didn't get too far, a hand closed on her wrist and she felt the touch all the way down to her toes. She turned and the world inverted. It felt like the music got louder, colour brightened. The pink in Natsu's hair was almost electric.

"Cana."

He was in an old Magnolia Police uniform, back when they wore light blue instead of black, and his old scuffed work boots. Cana knew without asking that the uniform was given to him by one Gildarts Clive. Her heart hurt all over again and she realized that for the last few weeks, she'd missed that pain. "Hey."

Natsu smiled sloppily; she missed that, too. "Got a light?"

Cana tugged her lighter out from between her breasts and Natsu took it and his pipe out of the thick of the crowd. She followed listlessly, relaxed again without Mira there. Natsu put himself against the barn's backboards. Their spot wasn't quiet, nor was it private, really, there were still people everywhere, but it was dark. Cana was high enough to put herself in front of him, her hips pushing into his. It was familiar. Natsu lit his favourite pipe and passed it to her. She reached for it without thought. Smoke filled her lungs. Her thoughts _whirled._

Natsu put his head back on the boards and Cana leaned into him. "You figure shit out with Lucy?"

Natsu kissed her and she supposed that was her answer. Everything blurred and became a mass of sound and colour, moans, touches. Soft, then intense. Cold. Her clothes were gone. Hot. Natsu was breathing on her neck. Sweet. His skin. His hands moved through her hair, the barn boards supported her. She anticipated what came after but was left wanting; Natsu was gone and now there was just the stars and the sky.

"What the fuck are you doing, Natsu?" said a voice Cana knew too well.

Cana opened her eyes. The colours were brighter than ever; strobing blue and red.

"Fuck," Natsu swore.

"You can't _be_ here."

"I'm not."

"Damn right you're not. Get the fuck out of here and wait for me back home. And if you're spotted—"

"Yeah."

Moments passed in which Natsu pulled away from Cana and did up his clothes but to Cana, it seemed like only seconds had ticked by. She slid down the side of the barn, aware, so distantly, that her shirt was gone, her pants and her boots and the cat ears Ultear had put on her head, too.

The ground was cold.

"Hell. Are you okay, Cana?"

Cana cracked open her eyes and focused on Gildarts' grizzly face. He was in his uniform. The new one. Black. She felt nothing looking at him. Not longing. Not fear. Not disappointment. She _wanted_ to. It was the drugs. Gildarts' radio blasted and a lady spoke into it rapidly. He swore and stood. Cana watched dazedly as he used long strides to take him to the edge of the barn, talking into his radio; she couldn't hear—no, couldn't _understand—_ what he said. The second he'd gone, though, a huge shape materialized out of the shadow of the maple trees lining the property and rushed to Cana's side. He bent and she recognized his white-blonde hair.

"Elfman…" He didn't speak to her as he gathered up what he could—her shirt, her pants, _her_. Cana went into his arms limply. "My _dad_ is here."

"The cops, Cana. The cops are here." Elfman started to move, dodging into the forest just as Gildarts came back around the building. Cana heard him cuss fluently but was too out of it to understand _why_. She stopped thinking about it; the shaking began and the sweating and the sickness.


	12. Chapter 12

There's a hole where your heart lies; I can see it with my third eye.

* * *

Cana knew things were bad when the room spun and she hadn't even opened her eyes yet. Her front was cold and her back was warm. Despite listening to the gentle in and out of breath for what felt like a long time, it was only when she felt a muscle spasm beneath her left shoulder blade that she realized it was a person she leaned against.

Her eyes felt cemented closed; she forced them open against her better judgement. There were tiles in front of her, light blue ones spider webbed from abuse and time. She knew them, not intimately, not yet, but they were familiar. _Yours_. She'd even started paying for them, and there was her razor. _Bathroom_ , her mind supplied, _you're in your bathroom_. Not just in the bathroom, though. There was high steel surrounding her. She was in the bathtub.

The person behind her must have sensed her waking because fingers twitched at her middle and the chest against her back expanded greatly. Cana looked down the line of her body and saw where their legs jumbled together. One of his feet were up on the tub's edge, both of hers were pushed under the one that wasn't. She wasn't naked, but she was greatly bare in a pair of underwear and a bikini top put on badly. Everything was damp. She hoped it was water but there was a vinegary scent to the air.

Getting her body to move was an idea bad by epic proportions because as soon as she tried, she felt sick. "Fuck." Even her voice betrayed her, hoarse and crackly. The man behind her grunted something almost unintelligible, giving Cana enough to work with; she'd know Elfman's voice anywhere. She gave more effort to get vertical.

Elfman kept her where she was with his arm folded across her chest. "Easy." His voice cracked just as much as hers.

Cana gave up the physical protest and went verbal. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

Elfman took a defensive tone. "The cops showed up and you couldn't get out of there on your own, so I brought you back here."

She might have been thankful if it was anyone else but this was one person she wanted to keep at arm's length, especially after their last run in. "And you _stayed_?"

Elfman was righteously unapologetic. "You were so out of it, I was worried."

"I was fine."

"You tried to go into your neighbour's house and then puked on the hood of their car." She didn't remember that at all. "When I got you up here, you started babbling and twitching and shit. You puked again all over your bedroom floor and the bathroom."

Cana rolled her head on her shoulders and saw that if he was telling the truth, he'd cleaned it up. There was the pile of clothes she'd been in last night by the door. That looked like her leather jacket bundled up in the mix, probably ruined. "Fuck," she swore again.

"I thought you were fucking dying." Cana was glad she couldn't see his face to register his concern; his voice did a well enough job of conveying without that help. "You scared me, Cana."

She couldn't drum up an apology or a thank you, too embarrassed and annoyed with herself. "What time is it?"

Elfman moved his hand away from her middle to grab a phone off a pile of his clothes beside the bathtub. The face lit up and Cana read nine.

"At night?"

"Yeah."

Cana put her head back against Elfman's chest exasperatedly. "What the fuck." Molly and alcohol and Black Pearl were thieves. A worse thought came to her. "I was supposed to be at work at seven. I'm two hours late for my shift."

"You can't go in like this."

"I have to. I need this job, Elfman. Get off me." Cana struggled to get up. Elfman sighed and put his hands on her waist, lifting her. Once vertical, Cana turned on the water and stripped off the remainder of her clothes. Elfman made no move to leave and she didn't ask him to; he made sure she didn't fall over when the room spun particularly viciously. He got naked and then got himself clean without any more lectures; Cana could feel the weight of his gaze, though. She struggled to take the focus off her.

"Why were you asking Ultear for that guy's number?"

Elfman brushed water out of eyes the colour of thunderheads. "He's the recruiting officer."

His meaning donned on Cana and she hated him for having a plan when she was still waking up naked, soaked in puke in her bathtub. She turned from him and finished washing. Elfman was less willing to let the conversation end there.

"You know you were talking about your dad last night?"

Draped in the haze of a drug-and-alcohol soaked memory, Gildarts appeared asking _are you okay, Cana?_ There may have been a brick in her stomach. She tried to laugh it off, though. "Weird. I haven't thought of that loser in years." Calling the deadbeat boyfriend her mom had for seven years before she died _dad_ made Cana feel gross but she'd rather that then venture down this dead-end road.

Elfman didn't join her laugh. "Is it true?"

How much has she muttered in some delusions grip? She was afraid of the answer but needed to know. "Is _what_ true, Elfman?"

"Clive?"

It felt like she swallowed a grapefruit. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yeah," he said eventually. "You were talking a lot of crazy shit."

Cana couldn't tell if he was serious or just entertaining her and frankly, she didn't care. She cranked off the water and got out of the tub. Elfman followed and used the towel she tossed his way. As soon as he was dressed, he was out of there.

Cana sorted through her ruined clothes before she left, trying to get all of her important things out so that they could be thrown out—they were ruined. The keys for her bike had survived. Her wallet and cell phone was a different story. They weren't there. "Fuck." She checked the house and the outside. They were nowhere to be found. There was no time to go check the barn; she had to get walking to Macey's. It was already going to take long enough. She stopped just to stuff a small mag light into the waist of her tights.

* * *

"You're three hours late."

Mister Bob had seemed kind when Cana first met him, a little eccentric, sure, but he ran the only strip club in town so she expected it. Now, though, sitting in a back booth of his establishment with a tall glass of water locked between his hands, his lipsticked mouth was turned down in a frown and his eyes looked hard and annoyed.

"I don't mind if you're sick, Cana, but you need to call." He didn't speak loudly over the music but his voice carried.

"Yes, Sir." She fumbled, wondering if he wanted to be called ma'am. Guessing at pronouns was never her forte.

He didn't flinch. Good. "I gave your shift away today."

"What?"

"I'm sorry. You know Saturdays are busy and I have no shortage of girls that want to work."

Cana felt hot tears press at her eyes. "I need this job."

He took in a deep, deep breath. "I'll put you on next week's schedule, Cana, but if you don't show up or if you show up drunk, or even hungover, you're out of here."

Cana knew she didn't have enough makeup on to cover up last night's misadventures; it was disappointing to know that it wasn't dark enough in the strip club to do the work for her, either. "I'll do better."

He patted her hand gently and stood. "Good night."

Cana took her leave; it was time to check the barn for her stuff.

* * *

Without the pulse of music and a sea of bodies, the barn looked downright menacing. Cana flicked on her flashlight. The beam sputtered before it evened out and illuminated the gravel driveway. Cigarette butts lay between bits of stone, Dixie cups, beer bottles. Someone would clean it up, eventually.

Wind cruised over the field, making the tall and unkempt grass sway violently back and forth. There were still some scarecrows out there, looking like disheveled and forgotten sentries holding vigil in the moonlight as clouds slid across the sky.

She'd be lying if she didn't admit that her senses were on alert. She wished Ultear was there; she'd even take Gray if she must, but with no way to contact them, here she was.

Cana walked up the driveway with purpose, telling herself that there were worse things to be afraid of. Real things. Like losing her job and ending up as some anonymous, forgotten in the system, Gildarts finding out that she came here looking for him and not gathering the courage to _tell_ him he was a deadbeat dad. Her missing motorbike made the list, too.

It wasn't out front of the barn where she left it. When she opened the squealing rolling door and peeked in, something alive startled. Cana held her breath, telling herself that it was an animal and that it was fine. She didn't relax but she did manage a cursory sweep with her flashlight. That was as much as she dared to do, she couldn't go in, not yet.

_Hunt for your wallet first, then_. Cana closed the door and walked around the side of the barn with her flashlight trained on the ground. She found plenty of garbage, an earring, ladybug wings, a condom, and a pair of black shiny boots sitting side-by-side. Her heart lodged in her throat and stayed there when she realized that those boots were filled with feet attached to legs that were likewise attached to a body.

Cana lifted her mag light like a club and brought it down in a wide swing that landed on the shoulder of her guest. He swore, she yelled and reeled back again. Her light was grabbed and torn away. Cana used her fists, pummeling wherever she could.

"Cana! Cana, stop!"

His voice took some time to penetrate the panic she'd been stewing in. "Gildarts. Fuck. What are you _doing_ out here?"

He flicked on a flashlight of his own and shone it beneath his chin. Despite being beaten, there was a playful grin on his face. His voice dropped low and got gravelly. "You're trespassing."

"You chucklefuck, Halloween is _over_. I almost beat your head in."

"I probably could have handled it."

She snorted, not so sure. "What are you doing here?"

He took to shining his light at her middle as to not blind either of them. "Waiting for you."

Cana's stomach pitched annoyingly. "Why?"

"Because after you took off last night, you didn't get checked into a hospital so I figured you weren't dead and if you weren't dead, you'd probably come back for this." He held up her wallet and her phone. Cana swiped them out of his hand. The phone was dead, the wallet still had her cash in it. A whole five dollars.

"Thanks. You could have left them at the station." She would have checked there eventually on the off chance that someone might have turned them in.

"I wanted to talk to you."

"So you meet me at an abandoned farm in the middle of the night? You have demons, Gildarts, the kind that will get you arrested."

"Hardy-har-har. What was I supposed to do when your phone's in my hand and you don't answer your door?"

"I was asleep."

"I came by again an hour ago."

"I was _trying_ to go to work."

"I heard you started at Macey's."

She didn't appreciate his tone. "What about it?"

"Nowhere else was hiring?"

"Not me. And before you ask, yes, I tried," she snapped as a familiar look came over Gildarts' face.

He patted the air. "Alright, alright. So why are you out here if you're supposed to be at work?"

"I was late and my shift was taken away." She said it matter-of-factly. Gildarts did her a solid and didn't come at her with sympathy.

"You go back, though?"

"Yeah."

"Good."

"Listen, this has been a nice chat and all, but I still got stuff to find so…" She started walking but Gildarts spoke and brought her up short again.

"Your bike."

"You know where it is?"

"Impounded until it's owner comes to pick it up."

"Fuck sakes."

"Sorry, Cana. If I could have stopped it I would have but…"

"What's the price tag on that?"

He shoved his hand through his hair; the ends stuck up messily. "Two hundred if you come pick it up in the next week."

"Perfect." She didn't _have_ two hundred. Cana spun back around the way she'd come. Gildarts was on her tail.

"You want a ride home?"

"Where you'll corner me and fill my ears with talk about being responsible and safe?"

He said nothing. Cana weighed her options. Worse than getting a drive and a lecture was walking home in the dark by herself. Besides, it felt like it had been a long time since she'd seen him. "Where's your shitty car?"

"This way."


	13. Chapter 13

Whisper, "Am I what your heart desires?"

* * *

The car Gildarts had for his personal use was a yellow '71 Mustang because, honestly, what other colour did a car like that come in? It was parked around the house on the other side of the property beside an old corn field that hadn't been tended in over ten years, likely. The vehicle smelled like cigarettes and coffee and late night rendezvous with many women if Cana understood what the tacky array of cards with lipstick marks smeared on their fronts meant, hanging off a cardholder on the rearview mirror. They were two of a kind, her and Gildarts. She had a collection of dick pictures she took and printed, pasting in a scrapbook, with every new conquest and that was kind of the same thing, wasn't it?

Cana looked over her shoulder. There was a load of takeout garbage thrown into the back and a few articles of clothing. A boot or two, one on the floor, the other, Cana suspected, was beneath the seat or in the trunk. It was a mess, though men like Gildarts, according to Natsu, thrived off controlled chaos. Natsu may have been an aficionado on the subject matter, not only getting the first-hand experience after being around Gildarts for so long but clutching hard to that learned mentality, as well. How could he not when aside from Zeref, Gildarts was the man he modeled himself off of? _That's a pity_. Cana recognized jealousy but couldn't do much about it.

"So, what's the plan?"

"The plan?" Cana asked over the sound of the motor coming to life. Pink Floyd's _Comfortably Numb_ spilled from the radio. Gildarts turned it down some then put the car into Drive.

"How are you going to get your bike back, Cana? Do you have money saved up? Are you going to leave it there?"

She put her head against the window and let out a sigh that fogged the glass. "I don't have the money to get it and I can't afford to leave it there so I guess I'm going to have to steal it back." He looked at her reproachfully, trying to see if she was joking, likely. The thought had actually crossed her mind, though she wasn't dumb enough to think that it would work. She conceded to reason. Bitterly. "I guess I'm walking from here on out."

Gildarts pulled out of the driveway and onto the long stretch of country road. "It's a nice bike. With some love."

Sure it was; it was also the only irresponsible purchase she'd made with the small amount of money her mother left after she died. It came from a scrapyard, meaning she didn't pay much more for it than what it was worth in metal, but after that, the bank was tapped. "It was."

"You sound so dire."

"It's a pretty fucking dire situation," Cana snapped. "What do you want?"

"I might have some odd jobs around the house if you wanted to earn some extra coin." His voice was carefully even. Cana looked at him sideways from beneath her lashes and wondered if he wore the same resolute and stubborn expression when he helped out Natsu or whatever other vagabonds that crossed his path. Probably; she wasn't anything special, just another troubled kid he'd thrown into a cell too many times. "You're soft, Clive."

He scrunched up his nose. " _Helpful_."

"You're a fucking bleeding heart."

"Do you want the job or not?"

"Doing what? Your laundry? Not fucking happening."

He finally looked at her. "Does it look like I need someone to do my laundry?"

"You definitely need someone to help you colour coordinate your clothes, that's for sure," she muttered, scrutinizing his brown leather jacket, pants of the same matching colour, though thankfully, not the same material, and—heaven help them—a Hawaiian T-shirt.

Gildarts looked down at himself and twisted his mouth to the side. "You're a fucking brat, you know that? Job? Yes, or no?"

"Not if I'm going to be your maid." Cana looked back out the window. _Comfortably Numb_ ended and ZZ Top's _La Grange_ came on in its place. Gildarts drummed his fingers to the beat, letting the conversation rest. It was a tactic to grab her curiosity. Cana tried to play the game, too, but she couldn't make herself focus on the music. "Would I be? Your maid?"

Gildarts looked at her. "Thought you weren't interested?"

It felt like giving in but she didn't want to give up her bike and if he was offering… "Don't fuck around, just tell me."

"I need work done to that bike I was telling you about," he said without much rigmarole. "Word on the street is, you're handy with that kind of thing."

"You want to pay me to fix your bike?"

"Unless you don't want the extra cash?"

"What's wrong with it?" she prodded, interested despite herself.

"Don't know, won't start," he said and tapped the dashboard affectionately. "I bought this thing at the same time and haven't thought much about it since. It's in the barn, though, if you wanted to come by and take a look at it tomorrow."

"Alright," she conceded. "I'll look. How much will you pay me?"

"The cost of getting your bike back," Gildarts said.

Two hundred wasn't bad, but… "What if it takes me hours to fix?"

"What if?"

"Other mechanics charge like, a hundred bucks an hour."

"Sorry, were you a registered mechanic?" he jabbed.

Cana hoped her glower penetrated the darkness in the car but wasn't entirely certain. She gave up. "Is Natsu going to be there?"

"Not that I'm aware of," he said shortly in a way that didn't really invite conversation. He turned down her road and pulled up to her house at the end. "I'll leave the barn unlocked. There're tools in there."

"I have my own." Cana asked, "Will you pick me up tomorrow?"

"I have to work," Gildarts said.

"How am I supposed to get there, then?"

"You got two feet," he replied.

It would take her almost an hour to get there on foot. Cana bit back any scathing remarks she had on the subject matter, figuring she'd pushed her luck enough, and got out. "Thanks for the ride." Gildarts waved with a restricted smile. He waited in the driveway until she was inside her house and the door was locked. Cana pulled out her phone when he'd pulled away and texted Natsu. He got back to her almost immediately and was receptive to the idea of giving her a drive.

* * *

Natsu watched Cana work from his seat on a sawed-off log. Early afternoon light set his hair ablaze and made his skin look dark. The apples of his cheeks were pinked from sitting out there for hours while Cana tolled over Gildarts' bike and he must have been cold in only a hoody and a pair of torn jeans but he made no indication that he wanted to leave. "So?"

"So…" Cana drew out the syllables distractedly as she counted the number of turns it took to reset the mixture screw on the carburetor.

Natsu wasn't patient. "What's wrong with it?"

"I hope only a dirty carburetor," Cana said after she got two and a half turns in with her screwdriver. "He was using shitty gas so it clogged the injection ports. You have to use premium in small engines. _Especially_ older ones."

Natsu was looking at her a little blankly; she waved him off and got to work putting the bike back together. Natsu lit a cigarette and struck up another conversation. "Did the cops pick you up the other night?"

"No. A guy I know pulled me out of there," Cana said cautiously. "You?"

"No," Natsu replied. "Zeref was waiting for me in the Dakota. We booked it across the farm field. Sorry," he added. "For leaving you there. I should have taken you with me, I don't know what I was thinking."

She shot a furtive look his way; he did look remorseful which, for whatever crazy reason, made her stomach do something unwelcomed. She didn't want either of them to catch feelings and bludgeoned the fuck out of whatever that plunging sensation was. "What happened with you and Lucy?"

Natsu took an extra long pull off his cigarette and looked at the smouldering white cylinder as he answered. "Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"She asked who you were, I told her, then she went to stay at her dad's like she was supposed to be."

Cana knew the look in his eye and thought she should hate it, and herself, maybe, for being the girl that Natsu used to keep Lucy at a distance. She turned from him and put her attention back on the bike, tightening the last of the cover plating. Natsu shuffled around behind her. Cigarette smoke was traded for something more pungent, though he'd gone lighter today than usual, taking marijuana instead of heroin and Cana had never been so grateful. It certainly felt like the lesser of the two evils when Natsu handed the joint to her.

"Changing it up?"

"Trying to go easy," he said vaguely. "I told Gildarts I would."

Cana was relieved he was the one that brought up Gildarts and not her. She pounced on the subject but hoped that it sounded casual. "Was he mad at you the other night?"

"He was pretty pissed," Natsu agreed. "Especially after I told him I'd stay out of trouble."

"Why does he care?"

"Crusader, I guess." Natsu finished his joint and stamped it out on the dying grass. "Thinks he can save everyone."

Which meant that she would forever share him with everyone, too. _If you can ever get up the nerve._ Fixing his bike was a start. Cana stood and, after siphoning out the old gas, putting in fuel stabilizer and pouring fresh gas in, she tried the engine. It kicked up loudly and idled better than it had in decades. She smiled, pleased with her handiwork and killed the engine again.

"You're pretty good, eh?"

"I get by."

"Zeref knows a guy that runs a garage," Natsu said. "I could ask him to see if they're hiring."

Cana hesitated. It was what she wanted but accepting his offer of help felt like getting another layer deep with Natsu that she wasn't sure was wise. Would he be telling her stupid things late at night, too, if she did?

Natsu lit up another cigarette as his phone buzzed. He picked it up and Cana saw the picture on the screen. A blonde girl, beautiful and bountiful in a white and green dress, smiling as she leaned against a tree. That was Stars in the Sky Lucy. She had a satin choker to prove it, wrapped around her throat, the star stitched into the material front and center.

Cana watched Natsu's face, the way his expression moved through elation to something so heavy, Cana felt its weight. She decided there that the only girl Natsu loved was Lucy Heartfilia, and if that was the case, then she could do what she wanted without fear. Like taking his phone from his hand. Natsu looked up, on the verge of reaching for it. Cana put it face down on the motorcycle's seat. "Maybe ask him to look into it," she said as she turned back around and positioned herself between his legs.

Natsu sensed the shift and the distraction Cana was offering and touched her thighs. "Sure."

The phone stopped buzzing by the time Cana lowered herself to Natsu's lap . One day, she thought, she'd ask him why he didn't think he could be good enough for Lucy. She didn't care today. Today, she kissed Natsu and forgot about all the shitty things that tried to drag her down.

He wasn't afraid to touch her anywhere and he never hesitated, going inside her shirt and beneath her bra, pushing it up to a spot uncomfortable. His hands were cold on her skin, and rough, calloused from doing odd jobs here and there, bruised and knobby like Elfman's from too many fights. It occurred to Cana as Natsu pushed his hips into her that she had a type. Destructive, self-loathing. Teeth sunk into her breast through her shirt and she stopped thinking about that, taking his face and tipping it upward. His kisses were delivered with a bruising intensity like this wasn't just something he wanted but needed. As long as his reasons were centered around punishing himself, that's all Cana cared about.

When kissing was no longer enough, Natsu picked her up beneath her legs and took her to his truck's hood. She sank to her knees on the cold ground without being asked and helped him out of his pants. He took her hair with one hand and the base of his cock in the other and put the tip on her tongue. Here, his body was warm and smooth. He throbbed when she did more than just lick and expelled a haggard breath when she took him as deep as she could. Natsu swore and closed his eyes. Cana thought it was so he didn't have to see her. She kept her gaze locked on him for the same reason, telling herself that it wasn't so bad being Assisted Housing Cana, she had all of the fun. She was the Cana that got come on her tongue and then was hauled back to her feet without the need for recovery in between.

Natsu dug through his wallet for a condom. By the time it was on, Cana was leaning over the hood with her pants down around her thighs. He came back and after getting inside, pushed her flat with his hands on her shoulders. The grip he kept was almost bruising and the pace he put forward was so furious, his breaths wouldn't come deeply. The truck's suspension creaked, and Cana couldn't even pant. This was the only way she needed Natsu, though to recognize that she needed him at all was to ruin everything.


	14. Chapter 14

Be still my haunted heart

* * *

Coraline raced across the screen of a bulbous tube TV, tripping in a garden of malicious flowers. Cana watched with attention divided, torn between that and a tarot deck she'd found in the bedside nightstand while looking for papers for Natsu to roll another joint with, flicking them through her hands but not laying them out. It was stupid superstition but she was afraid of what they'd say. Cana's mother used to have an identical deck that she'd read every week. Did they ever tell her anything useful? Not likely. She'd still lived a hard life, fighting battles she told Cana time and again to avoid—most of which revolved around the men she'd chosen to include in her life. Men that didn't really deserve her time. Men she kept around anyway because, simply, she was lonely. She never changed the way she did things. Cana didn't expect the bitterness when it came for her. To avoid the feeling, she put the cards facedown on the floor and focused on the screen. She'd seen this movie three times before because it was one of Mira's favourites. It was strange not to be watching it with her, but leaning against Natsu's legs with a bowl of popcorn mixed with leftover Halloween Twix between them was okay. Cana filled her hands with that instead; Natsu leaned down and helped himself. He was knuckle-deep when the door sounded.

"Yeah," Natsu called.

Cana distanced herself from his legs but not quickly enough that Gildarts didn't see when he entered the Bunkie. He looked between Cana and Natsu with a hard to decipher look on his face that smoothed away almost as quickly as it had come. "Hey."

"You're back late," Natsu said over the sound of a huge preying mantis tractor chasing Coraline over uneven terrain.

Gildarts leaned against the doorframe in what Cana thought of as a cop stance and let his eyes wander. They snagged on the deck of cards she'd been palming. Another difficult to read look came about him. "I had some stuff to take care of. Where did you find those?"

"In the drawer there," Cana said. His face pinched—that expression was unmistakable—displeasure and a touch of manic distress. "Is that okay?"

"Yeah," he said after a moment. "Careful with them, though, they're old."

"I was." She put the cards into the package they'd come out of, then, feeling possessed, Cana told him, "My mom used to have a deck just like this."

He looked at her and she thought for sure he was seeing someone else. How could he not, honestly, the older she got, the more she looked like the picture of the woman on her nightstand. She opened her mouth to spill her mother's name and get the conversation started. It got lodged in her throat like it did every time.

"They were popular there for awhile," Gildarts said. "Seems like everyone had a deck." The moment, if it had ever existed at all, was gone. "How did it go today?"

Cana reluctantly moved on. "Your bike started for the first time in probably fifteen years."

His brow rose. "Oh, yeah?"

"Sure." She showed him her teeth in a smile that felt way too genuine for its own good. Grinning pure like that happened right before people got hurt. She toned it back. "The carburetor was dirty, that's all."

"Huh. Thanks, Cana."

"And my bike?"

He looked at her blankly. "What about it?"

She felt a sudden surge of panic that was both too dramatic and unwelcomed. "I thought you said you were going to get it out of the compound for me?"

"Uh..."

"Are you _serious_?"

He smiled mischievously. "Just pulling your chain. You can pick it up tomorrow morning."

"You're hilarious," she muttered.

"I'll be here all day."

Speaking of all day, Cana checked her phone and saw that it was almost ten; she'd been there for too long. Rising, she handed the popcorn to Natsu and stretched. "I gotta get out of here."

"You want a ride home?" Gildarts offered.

"Sure." It was almost easy, accepting his offer. "Text me or something if you want," she said to Natsu. That was almost easy, too.

"I will," Natsu replied with no hesitation. The only time he second-guessed himself was when Lucy was involved.

"Are you staying here, Natsu?" Gildarts asked.

Natsu tipped his head back on the couch and met Gildarts' eye. "Can I?"

"Of course."

Natsu relaxed into the couch again and popped more popcorn into his mouth. Cana got her boots on and her black bomber jacket, the stand-in for her leather one until she could replace it. Gildarts held the door for her patiently and led her to his car after she'd called goodbye to Natsu. The car's doors still squeaked when opened and the engine rumbled like a beast.

"Do you put premium in this thing?" Cana's voice competed with the motor for loudness.

"Of course."

"Then why didn't you do that with your bike?"

"I was young and dumb."

"Wonder what that's like?"

Gildarts looked at her dryly. "Let's not throw stones. I seem to remember escorting a certain young lady into a drunk tank not so many weeks ago because she was being young and dumb."

Cana rolled her eyes. It was lost on Gildarts who was watching the road again. She took advantage of the moment and studied him without fear of being caught. He hadn't shaved in a couple of days, and his hair was messy; he had more lines on his face than when she'd first come to Magnolia looking for the man her mother had a turbulent relationship with. She wondered if it was work or home life that was stressing him out. What did he have to be stressed about, though? He had a dog and occasionally, a pseudo-son, but no relatives as far as she knew, aside from her, of course. Though, she supposed, there could be more illegitimate children running around with Clive blood in them.

She pried, unable to help herself. "Ever been married?"

It took Gildarts only a second to catch up and answer her abrupt subject change and foray into Personal territory. "No."

"Why?"

"Just… never found anyone, I guess."

Cana rapped his card clip, sending countless lipsticks spinning. "What's this then, huh?"

His mouth quirked. "Fuck, you're nosy."

Cana didn't apologize. "It's right there for everyone to see. Why so many girls?"

He got defensive. "I like to keep my options open. So what? I'm single, not dead."

"You're a pig, is what you're saying," Cana intuited.

"Remember what we talked about, Cana? Glass houses? I don't see you with a steady beau."

"Yeah. I'm not fifty."

"I'm _forty-six_ ," Gildarts corrected.

"The world rounds up."

"And assholes get to walk."

She smiled. "Sore?"

"Live it up, kid. One day, Time's going to come for you."

"Maybe. Or maybe I'll go when I'm still young and beautiful."

Gildarts had seemed playful until that moment; all humour fell away. "Don't joke about that."

"Gee. Mister Serious."

"I've been a cop for a long time, Cana. We've gotten some shitty calls and most of them are about kids." That wasn't all of it, she could see, he wanted to say more but reined in his words and she wasn't brave enough to ask for the whole tale. They drove in near silence after that, AC/DC keeping it from being completely awkward. Gildarts struck up conversation again when they were near the Patch. "Did you get Natsu to drop you off today?"

"Yeah," she answered.

Gildarts mulled over his words again. Cana didn't know him to be a hesitater. She prepared herself for whatever he was gearing up towards. "Natsu has some shit going on."

"I know."

He glanced at her quickly. "He talked to you?"

Cana shrugged. "Sort of, I guess. Things between him and that girl Lucy are messed up, and he and his brother live in an old movie store. It's weird but who am I to judge?"

Gildarts sighed through his nose. "If you're going to hang out, Cana, that's fine, just… go easy when you're with him."

She scrunched up her nose. "Go easy?"

"He's in a bad place, susceptible to suggestions. I'm trying to help him get clean because he's too fucking young not to be but it feels like every time I turn around, he's knee-deep in the same old shit, so just…"

His meaning donned on her. "You think I'm a bad influence?"

Gildarts' voice adopted a careful tone. "I think you like to party and I think that's what Natsu's looking for."

Cana didn't expect the bitter taste in her mouth. She knew what she was and who she was and she thought she was okay with that. If that were the case, though, why did it feel like a slap in the face to hear it spoken aloud by someone whose opinion she wanted to respect? "I see."

"Don't be like that, Cana."

She tried to be unaffected. "Like what?"

"Upset. I didn't say it to hurt you, I'm just trying to make sure that everyone gets what they need."

"Natsu. You want to make sure Natsu gets what he needs." Why was her throat so goddamn tight?

Gentling his voice didn't soften his words as he said, "Natsu reached out to me and told me he wanted to get better. Limiting his access to volatile situations is step one."

"Now I'm a volatile situation?"

He gave her the facts without apologizing. "You're a party girl, the one thing Natsu wants but doesn't need. Right now, the only thing you two are doing is pulling each other into this downward spiral. It has to stop somewhere and Cana, there're only two options. Either you put an end to it or you follow it all the way down to the bottom, destroying yourselves along the way."

Cana wasn't listening. The only thing going through her mind was getting out of the cramped car. Luckily, she could see her unit up ahead. The porch light was on, though she thought she turned it off. That didn't _matter._ She put her hand on the door handle and counted down the seconds to freedom.

"I want to help you, too, Cana, and it seems like... I don't know. You're trying half the time when you need to. I know you can do better, though." Gildarts pulled into her driveway and put the car in park. "Natsu needs support right now and if you can support each other, great, but if not—"

Cana pushed open the door and got out without listening to the rest of what he had to say. It slammed closed, cutting off his words. His window rolled down. "Cana, wait."

Cana tried her front door and found it open. That wasn't the only thing, a light was on inside she didn't remember leaving on. She would have been weirded out but she heard Ultear's belling laugh and the responding meek reply of another girl and she relaxed. Ultear knew where to find her spare key and she always brought with her distraction.

Today, that distraction was blonde and busty and loved the stars in the sky. She was leaning back on the couch while Ultear slid her fingers up her arm to her shoulder and then down through her hair. Her cheeks were rouged with makeup and excitement and embarrassment. Cana thought likely alcohol, too, if the bottle of vodka and the jar of pickles on the coffee table meant anything, but the three shot glasses on the table were still upside down, looking unused.

"Cana," Ultear said in her most sultry voice. "Finally. Have you met Lucy?"

"Not officially," Cana said warily.

"Lucy, best bud Cana. Cana, smoking hot Lucy."

"Hi." Lucy had a nice smile.

"Hey. What are you guys doing here?"

Ultear tapped the couch at her other side. "Lucy wanted to party. I told her this was the place to be."

_Because you're just a party girl._

Ultear poured Cana a shot of vodka and grabbed a pickle from the jar, waving the latter around enticingly. "We were waiting for you, Cana."

 _You don't have to be that girl._ She could be one that _tried._ One that fixed motorbikes and helped people instead of used them. _You could be someone you don't know._ Someone she didn't know _how_ to be.

"Are you okay?" Lucy sounded completely _sincere._

"Fine." Cana took the offered drink, shooting the vodka and biting the pickle to chase away the kick. She put the glass back on the table out of Ultear's grasp. "Can I talk to you for a minute? In the kitchen?"

Ultear didn't question why. She rose gracefully and drifted through Cana's house to the small kitchen. She put her hip against the dish-dotted counter and reached for Cana. Her hand was warm on Cana's wrist and her body soft when she pulled Cana against her.

It was easy to get sucked into Ultear's games. Cana found herself tasting silver lipstick well before she thought to stop herself. Glass dropped to the table in the living room, reminding her of her guest. She pulled back and said, "You brought me Lucy Heartfilia."

"Isn't she cute?"

Sure she was. "But what's she doing _here_?"

"She was feeling kind of down, I told her I'd take her out for some fun."

"Natsu—"

"Told her they were done."

"Yeah, but—"

"I don't care about buts." She pursed her lips. "That's a fucking lie. I like butts quite a lot and Lucy's is no exception. _Please_ , Cana."

"Doesn't she know who I am?" Cana hissed.

"She knows everything," Ultear said. "She's curious about you."

"About _me_ or about me and Natsu?"

"Does it matter?"

"I don't want drama."

"There won't be. I promise. Lucy's sweet. She _is_ , Cana," Ultear stressed. " _Please_. The first time she ever kissed a girl was _me_ two hours ago and she said she liked it. I'm dying to know what else she likes. Now, come have some fun." She took Cana's hand and pulled her out of the kitchen. Cana didn't know why she went. Maybe because Gildarts was right, she really _was_ just a party girl.

Lucy was still on the couch; she'd poured three shots of vodka and Ultear, despite the fact that she didn't drink, took the offered shot glass. Cana took the one Lucy held for her, too. Why not?

Ultear snapped the glasses together. "To the shitty men we don't love."

"And the shitty ones we do," Lucy muttered.

"Hear, hear." Cana choked back her drink and poured everyone another.


	15. Chapter 15

Heart language was never very useful

* * *

Cana thought she knew what it was to fall. She was wrong. There were a lot of different ways and so many places to land that she hadn't tried out yet, she discovered, as she lay in her bed with Ultear's naked body thrown over hers and the sounds of stifled sobs drifting into her room from the bathroom. Had she ever heard anything more earnest?

Cana listened to it continue for an embarrassing amount of time, trying to decide her course of action. She could lie there until Lucy cried herself to death or she could get up and see what was going on, though she had a pretty good idea already. Last night was a blurry haze but some things stood out. Kissing Ultear and kissing Lucy. Baring them both right there on the couch. Lucy pulling back before things could get too far and back again when Ultear tried to get her back into it. Ultear leaving her to watch and focusing all of her attention on Cana. Sometimes, Cana would look over and see Lucy looking at them wearing an expression of intent—she absorbed _everything_ and catalogued it with _efficiency_ —and horror, clutching her green lace bralette to her chest for dear life. She didn't leave, though.

In the present, Lucy's sobs turned ragged and Cana huffed. Getting up made the room spin. Her mouth was dry, dry, dry and her stomach was heavy. There was an oversized Jays T-shirt in one of her drawers. She pulled it on just as one of Lucy's hiccoughs escaped her hold. _You're just a party girl,_ Cana told herself as she crossed the room barefooted. _No one will blame you for leaving this one be. Party. Party. Meaning you drop your feelings at the keg and forget you've left them there at all._

Some stupid sense of guilt wouldn't let this one be and Cana rapped on the door against her better judgement. Lucy got quiet. Sniffling. Throat clearing. "I'll be out in just a minute!" She sounded like she was drowning.

"I don't want the bathroom." Well, yeah, she did, she had to pee and she needed to brush her teeth but she couldn't imagine Lucy sticking around for either of those things. "I wanted to talk to you."

Silence.

"Can I come in, Lucy?" She was _soooo_ far out of her element.

Lucy took so long in answering her, Cana was sure she wouldn't. Then she heard her get up and the door opened. Lucy flicked her eyes up and Cana saw that they were red-rimmed and puffy like they had been last night when she tried some of Ultear's weed. Too bad she wasn't high anymore. Lucy dropped her gaze and tried to sneak past without slowing. Cana didn't know her well enough to grab her by the arm and pull her up short but that didn't stop her.

Lucy looked surprised. Cana was, too. She decided she was committed now and went on full steam ahead. "Hang on a second."

"No, I have to go." Lucy twisted her wrist in Cana's hold, trying to get away, albeit not very hard.

Cana ignored her and asked the dreaded question. "Are you okay?"

Lucy's eyes filled with tears impossibly fast and spilled over before she could catch them. "I'm fine."

"If you were, you wouldn't be crying in my bathroom."

Lucy wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand. "It's nothing."

She was such a bad liar, it was pathetic. Cana sighed. "Why are you _here_ , Lucy?"

"I'm _trying_ to leave." She pulled her arm to emphasise her point. Cana still didn't let her go.

"No. I know that. I mean, why did you come here last night? This isn't your scene." That much was obvious with her three hundred dollar Ralph Lauren dress and last night's expensive makeup now running down her face.

Lucy glanced away. "I just wanted to—"

"To have a good time?" Cana suggested, using Ultear's favourite saying. She shook her head. "Bullshit."

Lucy's eyes got comically wide. She wasn't used to being spoken to in such a way. "Pardon?"

Cana spoke slowly. " _Bull-shit_. You probably thought—what, if you changed the way you were a little bit, made yourself like the girls Natsu ditched you to roll with, he would take back what he said? He'd want to be with you still?"

"I—no," she stammered.

"That's a lie. Trust me, Natsu doesn't need another me in his life, one's enough. The best thing you can do for him is stop playing at something you're not. That's not what Natsu needs right now." Cana parroted Gildarts' words in an attempt to do the right thing after she'd fucked so much else up.

Lucy's cheeks got red while she moved from lost and sad to mad. "You don't know what he needs."

Cana realized how she'd sounded. "You're right, that's not what I meant. Just that he needs someone in a good place right now. Someone—"

Lucy cut her off. "You don't _know_ Natsu, so stop pretending that you do. He's only hanging around you because—"

Cana waited for her to finish her sentence. Lucy _was_ a nice girl, though, and couldn't bring herself to purposefully hurt anyone, not even the girl she thought was taking Natsu away.

"Hey, what's going on?" Ultear appeared in the hallway. She'd found one of Cana's plaid shirts and only bothered to do it up partially, a long slice of pale skin visible running down to her belly button.

Cana only had enough energy to deal with one of them. "Go home, Lucy, and don't try to be like us. Your life will be better for it."

Lucy jerked away and stumbled down the stairs.

"Lucy!" Ultear only called her name, to chase after her was too much effort. The outer door slammed. Ultear pinned Cana with a dirty look. "What's wrong with you?"

Cana put her back against the wall and pushed her messy hair back from her forehead. "Nothing."

"Really? Then why did Lucy just run off crying?" Ultear ordered.

"Because you and I are both shitty people," Cana bit back.

Ultear had the decency not to argue, only saying, "That doesn't mean wreck a good thing."

Cana said, "Leave, Ultear."

Ultear knitted her brow. "Now you're throwing me out, too?"

"Get _out_!" Cana's throat scraped raw.

"You're fucked," Ultear muttered and turned away.

Cana remained where she was while Ultear returned to the room for her clothes and stayed there past the time Ultear left. With only herself for company, she listened to the bathroom's leaky faucet drip, drip, drip and replayed the last twenty-four hours over again in her head. It never felt less like a horror show.

From somewhere down on the first level, Cana's phone buzzed. She pulled herself out of her stupor and followed the sound downstairs. The phone was silent by the time Cana found it stuck between the couch cushions. There were a missed call and two pending messages via text, one from Mister Bob asking her to come into work and one from Natsu asking if she wanted to hang out. She replied to Mister Bob and deleted Natsu's. Not that she thought that would be a permanent fix, she'd need to talk to him eventually.

* * *

The customers in Macy's weren't supposed to touch the dancers. There were security guards to ensure that and everything was generally very safe and very civil. There was always the one customer, though, that thought if they couldn't get with the dancers, they could with the servers. Cana had been a little thrown by the idea at first but then realized if she flirted a little, she could get a bigger tip. Sometimes, the customer would get carried away and think it was okay to slide their hand up the inside of her leg. Most of the time she stopped them before they could get very far but _sometimes,_ if their cash roll was fat, she'd let them squeeze her behind where her cut-offs stopped. It was the difference, she found, of walking out of Macy's with forty dollars in tips or sometimes, a hundred or more. It wasn't a great gig when everyone was thinking about tipping the dancers and not the servers so whatever she could do to make ends meet, she'd do it.

Almost all of the regulars knew how the servers played the game and seemed to be okay with it. Macao, though, refused. Try as Cana might, flirt as best as she could, she couldn't get more than a toonie out of him per drink. He was always responsible, only ordering two beers throughout the night, and he always drank them slowly. Tonight was more of the same. He sipped his beers, and when it was time for the doors to be locked, he walked out the front mostly sober.

Cana didn't hold it against him. He was functioning in a dysfunctional life, getting up the next morning and counseling more troubled youth, then going home to his unhappy wife and his children. He was a wreck but still doing better than Cana was, for sure.

Vodka had made a fucking mess out of things recently but she'd give anything to have some right then. _So hurry up._ Cana cleared Macao's table, pocketed the two dollars he left and checked in with the kitchen. Dish pit was finishing up; the cooks were cleaning.

Mister Bob appeared out of the office behind the drink fridge. "Is the front cleaned?"

"All of the tables are, yeah," Cana replied. "Sherry's checking the bathrooms."

"Alright. I'll see you on Thursday, then, at seven," he said and Cana smiled. Until he called that morning, she hadn't been on the schedule at all.

"See you then." She took her small pile of tips back out of the kitchen and to the back of the club. Someone had turned the lights on and cut out the music so now it looked rundown and well-used, pleather seats cracked, table tops stained with moisture rings, floors scratched and heaved in some parts.

It was ugly as sin and she loved every quirk.

Orga, one of the bouncers, waited for Cana at the back of the club in the hallway that connected to the back alley staff entrance and the change rooms.

"Buying tonight?"

"Yeah," Cana said on a whim. It had been a shitty couple of days, why not?

"Meet me out back when you're ready," he told her and disappeared out the exit. Cana went to the girls' change room, grabbed her coat to go over her bandeau and her purse, and tightened the laces of her combats. She would have changed her shorts, it was supposed to snow, but she was hoping Orga would give her a bit of a discount.

"Night, Cana, and careful on your way home."

Cana found Erza, one of the dancers, stepping behind one of the shower curtains and winked at her. "Always. Night."

She exited out of the dressing room and followed Macy's hallway to the glowing EXIT sign. On the other side, cold air bit into Cana's legs and immediately froze her nose. She put her hands in her coat's pockets and hunched her shoulders against a sudden and vicious gust of wind.

Orga was waiting for her beneath one of the yellowed streetlamps, wearing a wool-lined jean jacket with the collar popped. He was halfway through a cigarette and shuffling his feet back and forth to keep himself warm. "There you are. Good night?"

"It was okay," Cana said.

"I saw that guy feeling you up. I know you girls do it to get better tips but if it's bugging you, let me know."

"Bacchus is harmless," Cana replied. Just drunk and horny, nothing she hadn't dealt with before.

Orga half smiled. "If you say so."

Cana shivered. "It's freezing. Let's hurry up."

"How much do you want?"

"Just a gram."

Cana dropped her eyes and counted out her money so she missed his expression and his meaning at first when he said, "You know, a little extra will get you the good stuff."

"That's all the cash I have," Cana handed over the bills. "It's fine."

He laughed; she didn't like it. "You know what I mean. The same treatment you give those guys." He nodded to the strip club. "I'll throw in another half gram."

Oh.

Orga took her silence as acceptance and took a handful of her ass without asking. He palmed her breast next. Cana pushed him away when he tried to kiss her, too. "I didn't say _yes_."

"You don't like it?"

Words failed. It was like she'd said yes for so long, she didn't know how to say no. Orga took his dick in his hand through his pants and pushed it against her. He was stiff already and large and almost out because he was undoing his zipper. "A little kiss and I'll knock five bucks off."

_He's serious_. And she was thinking about letting it happen. As soon as Cana absorbed and appreciated her situation, she shook her head. "Not a fucking chance." She used her best sing-song voice and ducked beneath his arm.

"Hey." Orga grabbed her bicep and held her back. She didn't appreciate how strong he was until his fingers were cutting into her skin, not too hard, not yet, but hard enough that she was uncomfortable. His voice when he spoke was wheedling. "Come on, Cana. You're good for it."

"I said _no_." She pulled her arm away from him with force and walked quickly. He chased after her.

"What if I take the money off and throw in another gram?"

Cana turned and walked backward so he could see her face clearly as she told him, "You're a _pig_." Maybe he'd understand.

His face twisted. "You think you're too good for me or something? Is that it? Because there's a fucking _wall_ in the guy's room dedicated to your slutscapedes."

"Keep going, Orga. You're really making your case. Desperate asshole is the new sexy," Cana said.

His brows came together and his mouth tugged down. "What did you just say to me?"

Cana gave him her favourite finger. He increased his speed, closing the distance between them, and her heart lodged in her throat. She'd only worked at Macy's for a couple of weeks but she'd seen him bloody his share of handsy and drunk assholes, wearing the same expression he was now. She didn't want to fathom what he was thinking then.

It would be easier to turn her back to him and get _moving_ but if she did that, she wouldn't be able to see exactly where he was or what he was doing and that uncertainty brought with it a flavour of fear she didn't care for much. She put herself into a sideways run, kept her hands balled into fists, and didn't look in front of her enough. There was no plan, just get away. Fight if she needed.

The alley's edge came for her, alight with bright streetlamps whose security was nothing but an illusion. She kept going out over the sidewalk and over the curb, too, into the path of two blazing headlights. A horn blared; Cana couldn't move in time. Tires squealed and she was smacked in the hip at five kilometers an hour by the grill of an Acadian Beaumont.

Though she wasn't hit at speed, the force of it was enough to send her flying forward, off balance. Cana tasted pavement, scratching up the elbow of her bomber jacket and scraping her bare legs with mild road rash. She was too shocked to swear for a full five seconds, then she did so colourfully. It didn't touch her bruised ego.

Orga laughed from the alley's edge and disappeared back into whatever hole he'd crawled out of as the Beaumont's door opened and someone familiar stepped out. "Fuck. Are you okay? You just stepped out. I tried to stop but—" He trailed off when he recognized her. "Cana…" and then started again. "Do you need to go to the hospital? Or do we need an ambulance? We do, don't we? Fuck. Are you hurt? Where? Where does it hurt?"

The bombardment of questions was giving her a headache. "Relax. I'm fine."

"I ran you _over_ —"

"It was only a love tap." Cana started to stand. Her butt and leg hurt and her elbow. He saw her wincing. Out came his phone and the number nine was dialed. Cana yanked it out his hand and cleared the number before he could add two ones. "I don't need a goddamn ambulance."

He blinked and blinked. Tumblers fell. "Then we need to go to the hospital." When Macao Conbolt decided that a thing had to be done, his mouth set with grim determination. He came to Cana's side and forcefully shuffled her to the passenger's side of his car.

"I'm _fine,_ " Cana protested one last time. "You really didn't hit me that hard."

"You feel fine now but in a few minutes that might not be the case. I'll never forgive myself, Cana. We'll just get you checked out." He used his best _Adult_ voice and Cana found herself bowing to his years' experience. He put her in his cluttered car that smelled like ancient velour seats and a pine Little Tree and even put her seatbelt on for her. She settled back. He was right, everything hurt a little more as the seconds ticked by. She put her head back against the headrest and breathed out. Macao got in and they started moving.


	16. Chapter 16

You are the heart; I am the nail.

* * *

Bad decisions were difficult to recognize. They hid in laughter and hurt and were glossed over by what Cana knew to be desperation when she was sober. She didn't think about that as she lay on her back and watched her ceiling warp and spin. She thought about how her knees were digging into her breasts and how that hurt slightly even five days after her run-in with the grill of a car. She thought about how it restricted her breathing. And she thought about _his_ breathing.

In and out.

In. in. in. out.

In. Out. In and hold while he slammed his hips into her and the sound of flesh against flesh filled her small and undecorated room.

It felt good. Distantly. As it had the first time they did this. And the second. The third, too. He was more experienced than anyone else she'd ever been with and it showed. He made her come faster, his fingers inside of her for all of two minutes before he angled them up, found that hard to reach spot, and brought her rushing into an orgasm. She felt better. In a way. She felt worse, too. He kissed her neck and she couldn't get over the feel of his mustache on her skin. It was strange. She'd never had anyone with a mustache before. Sometimes, Elfman would grow a beard but it was not the same thing.

He teased her breasts and got a response from her body that she felt on the surface. It was all about her. She'd never had that before, either. It robbed some of her enjoyment, somehow.

When it was time for him to finish, he sat up and grabbed her legs, fingers digging in hard. Cana looked at him from between her lashes and caught him looking at her in a way that made her feel uncomfortable. Reverently. Here was his barely eighteen fantasy come to life. For all the times she'd felt powerful during their interactions, she felt helpless now and couldn't say why. She shook in every one of her muscles until he stopped orgasming, then she bludgeoned the feeling to death and pushed Macao back.

He rose and went to the washroom, oblivious. Cana listened to the sink come on and turn off and didn't move, feeling messy and in pieces. He came back, naked, and he looked nice enough. Fit for a man of his age, as she expected him to be. He was both vain and insecure.

He didn't hit and quit. He came to the bed and laid down and Cana allowed for it, as she had the days before when he brought her back from the hospital with a few new bumps and bruises and a prescription for codeine to help with the minor pain. She even allowed for his fingers to slide down her center, between her breasts, past her ribs, to her hips. Her thighs. He laid a kiss on her collarbone. It was a simple action. It left her feeling _cold._

"I'll talk to Enna later this afternoon. She's home."

"Enna?" Cana repeated.

"My wife."

How strange, here she was, undermining a thing that was supposed to be sacred and she didn't even bother learning the other woman's name.

"She'll get the house but that's okay. I have a family cottage that she doesn't have any right to, we can go there. It'll be rough for a bit while we get the divorce finalized but afterward…"

Cana turned and looked at him. He was watching the ceiling, putting all of the pieces of the puzzle together with a focus that was admirable. Had he always been so _sincere_? Yes. Yes, he had been. It's what drove him to be a therapist and to work with troubled youth. Cana could see that nugget of goodness in him _clearly._

"We'll be together and it won't be so hard. You can get rid of this place and actually save your money. I'll help you go to school." He glanced at her finally and there was a _genuine_ smile on his mouth. Cana's heart lurched.

"You're leaving your wife?"

He looked back at the ceiling again. "Things have been rough for a while. This week especially, though. I think she knows. It'll be a relief to tell her."

Cana sat up. Her bruised elbow panged. "You can't do that."

Macao was resolute. "When I first thought about it, I was scared, too, but then I thought, seeing as how I'm not your therapist anymore and you're not staying at Fairy Hills, this is the only thing keeping us from going forward." It was obvious he'd put a great deal of thought into this. Had he been concocting a fantastical future since she leaned forward in his car that rainy night and kissed him? He _was_ a methodical man.

 _Which means he's serious._ And she had to stab this in the heart before it started to breathe on its own. "I'm not moving in with you."

He barely hesitated. "You're right, that's fast when you're just getting your independence. You keep your job and get on your feet, I'll support you in whatever way you need when you need it. If you decide a little later that you want to go to school, you can ditch this place and move in. Until then, though, we'll go slow."

"We're not _going_ anything," Cana said clearly.

He turned and looked at her when he heard the razor's edge in her voice. "What?"

"This was just a hookup. The last few days have been fun, sure, but that's it."

He searched her eyes, likely looking for the lie. Cana did what she could to look fierce and sure. Her words were mirrored back at her. "A hookup."

"That's what I said."

Seeing the realization come to him was gross. He took in her words, he turned them around, he _absorbed_ them and their meaning, and then he looked forward, toward what that would mean in the future. "You've been leading me on for days for a _hookup_."

Cana pushed his shoulder. "I didn't lead you anywhere you didn't want to go. Don't blame this on me."

He pressed his fingers to his temples and swore. "I have a fucking _wife._ "

Cana said, "You haven't told her anything. We can just pretend this never happened."

"She knows. I didn't come home the night you went to the hospital _or_ last night." His tone was accusatory. "Enna's not _stupid._ "

"Well, that's not my problem. You should have thought of that _before_."

He massaged his temples more furiously, mind churning. After a moment, he took his hands away and seemed more composed. His fingers brushed Cana's naked hip. "Maybe I was too hasty. Let's try again. I won't talk about anything with Enna and—"

Cana pushed his hand back and dug the knife in so he _got the point._ "We didn't fuck because I wanted to be your kid's new stepmom. We fucked because I wanted to fuck. That's all."

He growled in frustration; his neck turning red. "Cana—"

"I think you should go."

The frustration intensified and he looked like he was going to scream or cry. Cana wanted nothing to do with either. She pushed his shoulder again and got him up. Once he was there, he got his clothes on and his glasses, too. She watched him leave and listened to his Acadian rumble to life. Her eyes burned. She buried her head in her pillow and did what she could to ignore the feeling.

* * *

Nine Inch Nails' _Closer_ thrummed in Cana's ear. She swayed to it and alternated between watching tables and watching the stage. Erza was up and her dances were always a good show, even if she generally directed all of her attention to her biggest fan, who always sat front left to the stage and _always_ tipped her ridiculously. He was kind to Cana's pockets, as well, tossing her a twenty at the end of the night. She made sure he had a fresh drink and a clean table.

He lifted his glass and finished the remainder of the whisky he'd purchased. Cana made her rounds, taking it from him and returning to the bar where a girl named Angel worked. "Another whisky, please, for table ten."

Angel rang it up on her computer and disappeared. Cana put her back against the bar. Thursdays were busy and the place was starting to get crowded. She found Orga in the corner. He had his eyes set not on Macy's floor but on Cana and she didn't like what that look said.

Angel returned with the tumbler and Cana turned her back on Orga to make her delivery. Table ten looked up and smiled at her, the tattoo over his eye crinkling. It was a nice smile, _sure_. Crafty, though. It fit with the suit he wore and the shining shoes.

"Why do you hang around a place like this?" Cana asked on a whim. "Looks like you can do better."

"I could ask the same," he replied.

"Can't say you're right about that," Cana muttered under her breath. He wasn't listening to her, leaning forward when Erza came within reaching distance so he could throw money on the stage for her. The smile Erza had in store for him was as wicked as they came and overflowing with something so intense, Cana had to look away. She started toward the bar again. Mister Bob was out, which was unusual, and Orga was talking in his ear. There was a girl at his side Cana recognized vaguely, Minerva, and in her hand was a very familiar-looking leather backpack.

Mister Bob looked up as Cana approached, his eyes on her unwavering. As much as she wanted to go about her business, she could not. With a heavy sigh, she crossed the room to see what bullshit Orga was slinging her way. Mister Bob took the bag from Minerva's hands and nodded Cana toward the back, past the bar, into the kitchen, and eventually, into his office. It was a bare place, furnished with a padded chair, a desk neatly kept, a computer and a calendar on the wall.

He didn't even bother to sit. "Is this your bag?"

"Yes." Cana reached for it. Mister Bob gave it up.

"Minerva knocked it off the shelf in the change room."

"Okay."

"And this fell out." He slapped on the table a baggy packed full of weed that wasn't hers and a mickey of vodka that was. "Get your stuff, Cana."

"Wait—"

"You were warned." He looked both mad and regretful.

"Okay, yeah, but that pot's not mine," Cana said. " _Really_ ," she pressed.

His expression got dry. "And the alcohol? That's not yours, either, right?"

"I wasn't drinking it," she said. "And having it isn't a crime. I just picked it up before my shift and I was taking it home."

He still didn't look impressed. "Even if I gave you the benefit of the doubt, Orga said you cornered him on your last shift and tried to purchase drugs."

She couldn't even scoff at his formality, she was too furious. " _He_ approached _me_."

Mister Bob shook his head. "I'm sorry, Cana."

"But I didn't even buy any!" Cana fumed. "I didn't get the chance! He started grabbing at me, wanting me to fuck him, and when I said no, he got mad and chased me out into the street. I got hit by a car just to get away from that handsy psychopath!" She yanked up her shirt and showed off her bruise as proof.

He didn't rebuke her like she thought. He stopped, got very, very serious, and asked, "Is this true?"

"Of course it is," she responded and dropped her shirt again.

Mister Bob lifted the phone on his desk and dialed in a number he knew off by heart.

* * *

Seeing Gildarts before she was ready was like a kick in the guts. He was in his official uniform with a pad of paper, a pen, and an unlit cigarette in his opposite hand. He tapped his foot agitatedly as he listened to Cana speak in truncated segments about what happened, the small sexual assault interrogation room, complete with a tiny loveseat and a comfortable chair for the officer, in the Magnolia Constabulary throwing her words back at least ten times over as she repeated herself, again and again, answered the same questions, did the same old song and dance when the only thing she wanted to do was go home and forget this entire day happened. No one asked if she wanted to report an assault, no one asked if she wanted Gildarts to handle it, but she was picked up in the current and deposited messily on the banks of the No Control River.

 _Finally,_ after an hour of merciless questions, Gildarts closed his pad of paper and looked at her. His eyes drooped exhaustedly behind a pair of wire-framed reading glasses and his face was a little ashen. "That's all, I think unless there's anything else you want to add."

"No. You look tired, Clive."

"It's one in the morning, I've been up since five." He didn't look like he wanted her pity so she didn't give it to him. "I'm going to be honest here. I'm not sure we have enough to press charges." His expression changed like he was expecting her to rage. Cana was practical. Not just practical. Relieved.

"I know. Nothing really happened. He grabbed me and chased me." She shrugged. "I wouldn't have even reported it if it wasn't for Mister Bob." And all the good divulging that did her. She was still put on a modified work schedule for trying to buy drugs outside of his establishment. She couldn't pay her bills like that.

"You should have reported it," he told her firmly. "And I'm glad you did. It's good to have this kind of thing on record. If he does it again, we can use this to back up the claim." He took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "You should have come in the night it happened, though."

"I was in the hospital," she said.

"All you had to do was call and I would have come." For a second, Cana's heart swelled. Then he said, "It's my job. Being in the hospital doesn't preclude you from that," and she fell a long, long way for no reason she could name.

"Yeah." Cana stood without knowing if it was okay to leave or not. "Thanks for doing your job, Officer."

The step back into the formal threw him, that was clear. Gildarts rolled with it. "You want a ride home?"

"No. That's fine."

"It's late."

And it was going to be later still, she had a date with Fairy Tail's bar. "I'm a big girl."

"Cana." The way he called her name made her stall by the door and look back over her shoulder. "Be careful."

"Always," was her favourite lie.


	17. Chapter 17

I'll serve you up a special dish of heartache.

* * *

Fairy Tail's party was already in full swing by the time Cana rolled into the bar at two. Last call was in half an hour and she played catch up like a champ, sticking to tequila and lime that she shot with very drunk and very generous strangers to get her drinks for free. Some tried to put their arms around her shoulder. She could warn them all she liked, it seemed, but the dense ones would remain that way. She deked them expertly and zeroed in on the ones that wouldn't expect anything more than a party girl. Her options were limited, though that didn't mean that she was out of luck.

The bar was sticky with tequila and lime juice, grainy with salt, and rough beneath Cana's elbow. She adjusted and listened to her buyer's laugh. It was a nice one. Infectious, though it never ran _too_ deep. That was good. Nothing ever changed for Laxus Dreyar. This was how she liked him and he never tried to give her anything different. He never asked her about much of anything. He never tried to get sweet. The only kisses he'd ever given her were on her body and the only nice thing he ever said was how good she was at giving head.

Money landed on the bar at two-thirty; Cana was flying and following Laxus out into the pockmarked driveway. He had a blue '71 Chevy Monte Carlo that, when Laxus cared to visit Fairy Hills and his grandfather, Cana had spent a fair amount of time inside, both in the backseat and under the hood.

Tonight, it was like stepping into something familiar. Everything else was a bust but this, at least, was something she could depend on. Laxus opened the driver's door with his key and Cana snuck past him, climbing into the backseat by the orange glow of a streetlight that spilled in through the rear window. The car smelled not like air freshener but cologne and laundry detergent from the blanket down on the bench seat. He was always prepared.

Cana kicked off her shoes, Laxus was particular about that and dumped her torn up bomber jacket on the floor mat. It was cold out and cold in the car, too, but all of that was buried beneath the glosser of alcohol and sex. Laxus joined her and locked the door—they'd had it torn open on them before. It was a mood killer when your friends busted in on you and they weren't _in_. The key ended up in the ignition and Muse's _Psycho_ came out of the speakers.

Laxus didn't talk as he straddled her hips and moved higher, he wasn't in it for the sweetness. Cana already knew what he wanted without needing direction, and pulled down the straps of her tank top. He had his cock out and between her breasts in seconds, warm and smooth. In contrast, the zipper of his pants scraped her and his hands pressed her together almost painfully. She didn't adjust for it, needing the opposition, it helped her keep everything compartmentalized. Every time he thrust forward, the car would rock and her shoulders hit the body. Laxus panted above her. She thought he'd come. He may have, but he slowed so he could take her hair in hand and push up, up into her mouth. She opened for him and felt him get harder. He kept the thrusts short and sweet and was off of her in moments, backing up and rummaging through the glovebox. Cana breathed easier without his weight squishing her breath out.

The sound of plastic opening reached her ears. She closed her eyes and listened, not really in synch with what was happening; the last tequila shot was sinking in and she felt happy and dull. Her legs were spread. Fingers brushed over her center and slipped inside and a tongue joined in. Cana latched onto that sensation. It was all that was real. She grabbed his hair and he didn't even reprimand her for messing it up like vain Laxus had last time. He must have been too into it, too.

A creeping shiver moved over her body in reverse, beginning at the tips of her toes and ending in her temples. Cana arched into his tongue and let the orgasm come for her. Laxus sucked on her for another second then backed up.

"Turn around and get on your knees."

She had to plant one foot on the seat and the other sort of on the floor to comply. It wasn't the most comfortable. She got swept up in another tide of drunk and forgot. Laxus pulled his pants down more and pushed inside. From there, everything was a whirlwind. He pulled her back so she was on his lap and her head was basically hitting the ceiling and fucked her so hard, she felt nothing, not good, not bad, just friction. He wrapped his arms around her and held her breasts. It was closeness but it wasn't intimacy, meaning it was perfect. Cana closed her eyes again and listened to the car's suspension screech; the radio didn't stand a chance at blocking it out.

The only reason Cana knew Laxus came was because he pushed up into her so far, she felt him bottom out. He dropped his hips again. She breathed in the sweat; her breath condensed on the way out and when he released her, she was cold for the first time in minutes. Laxus pushed her up and helped her sit back down and started dressing. Done, just like that. He didn't need any lessons on hitting and quitting.

"This is yours." He handed her jacket over only after trying to put it on himself. Cana fixed her shirt and stuck her arms in her coat sleeves. They were _freezing_. The feeling passed and she started to warm up again. Once she got her pants on, it was even better, though again, her underwear was sacrificed to the great beyond. That was two pairs in as many months. Bad odds.

"How long are you in town for?"

Laxus shrugged. "Colleges are on strike so until they go back to work. Swing by Fairy Hills if you have time."

Cana laughed and dropped herself back into the seat. " _That's_ not going to happen."

Laxus was much soberer than Cana gave him credit for, his movements as he got rid of his condom out the window and fixed his pants were sure. "Why? Anyone can visit, you just have to check in at the front, you know that."

"I fucked up." She hadn't planned on telling _anyone_ her secret but she was drunk and Laxus seemed as good a person as any.

"What do you mean?"

"I added a notch to my bedpost that I shouldn't have," she lamented.

"Uh oh," Laxus said in that sarcastic, I-don't-really-care-but-I'm-going-to-ask _way_ he had _._ "Who did you screw?"

"Macao Conbolt." She spat his name out and it kind of felt like she was getting rid of poison.

Laxus scoffed. "Come on."

"I'm not kidding," she said. "He hit me with his car and then, you know…"

"Romantic."

"Fuck off."

Laxus went for a pack of cigarettes he'd left on the passenger's seat. "For real?" He lit one up and the cabin filled with the sweet and burning scent of smoke.

"No, I'm fucking joking, isn't that fucking _hilarious_?"

"Chill." He sucked in a lungful of smoke. Cana's nose started to burn.

"Easy for you to say, it was fucking gross. He started talking about leaving his wife and moving in together and shit like he didn't get what _hookup_ meant."

"But you set him straight?"

"Of course."

Laxus said, "Then who cares?"

" _Me._ He has _kids_. Him and his wife have been married for _years_. What the _fuck_ was I thinking?"

"It's probably not as bad as you think it is."

It _was_. Laxus didn't much care, though. Cana told herself again that that's the way she preferred him. She put her head back against the headrest and sighed. "These last few months have been a fucking wright off." _So start over again._ She didn't know _how._

Laxus leaned forward and started the engine. "I'm supposed to be taking the old man to an appointment tomorrow."

His meaning was clear. "Thanks for the ear." Cana zipped up her jacket and fumbled for the door latch. "See you."

"Yeah."

Cana closed the door, cutting off his reply. He rolled out of there a second later and it was just her and the mostly empty parking lot. It had cleared out quite a bit. Her bike was in the corner beside a beat-up purple Mazda. She looked at it for what felt like eternity, weighing her options. Usually, she thought she was okay to drive but tonight the tequila was hitting hard. Gildarts chimed in her head, telling her to be careful. She hated him, she decided there. It was childish. He didn't _know._ And that wasn't his fault. Well. That's not true. It was. It was his fault for leaving and choosing his job over her mother. She supposed it was her mother's fault, too, for never reaching out to him and telling him the truth. And it was _Cana's_ fault for letting it continue as it had for the last eighteen years.

"I'm fucking sick of this shit."

Cana pulled out her phone. She didn't have Gildarts' cell phone number so she tried his office, asking the lady at the front desk for his extension. She was put through. Gildarts' answering machine was generic, _"Hello, you've reached the voice mail of Constable Gildarts Clive, I'm unable to take your call at the moment. If it's an emergency, hang up and dial 911, otherwise, leave your name and number and a detailed message and I will return your call as soon as possible."_

The phone beeped. Cana listened to the silence on the other end of the line. _Now or never,_ she told herself. She wrenched the words out. "I need to talk to you. It's—important. Not 911 important. But. You know. So just… call me back, I guess. Or don't. Um… No. You should. It's about… well. Just call me."

She was pressing _End_ when she realized that she didn't leave her name. She thought about calling back and adding that in through a separate message but chickened out. Either he'd get the message and recognize her voice so he could call her back or he wouldn't have any clue and it would go _nowhere_. _At least you tried._ Not _very_ hard but hard _enough._

"Cana?"

Cana spun around on her heel and almost sent her self and her phone flying. Natsu was there to catch them both. "Woah."

"I'm fine." She backed out of his hold. There wasn't far to go, her butt hit her motorbike. It listed then came back down, heavy enough it wouldn't just topple over.

"What are you doing out here?"

"Going home, obviously." Gone was her thoughts of responsibility, she just wanted to get away.

"Let me give you a ride."

"No, thanks."

"You're smashed."

"And what are _you_ doing here? Drinking water?" There was no softening her sharp tone. Natsu was good for it.

"I was picking up Zeref but he hitched a ride with Ultear."

Ultear. Another fuck up. "Does it bug you?"

"What?" Natsu asked warily.

"That she fucks you when Zeref turns her down but goes back to him when it seems like he'll put out."

Anger flicked across Natsu's face. It went away. "Come on." He snatched the keys from her hand; she didn't even remember taking them out.

"Hey!" Cana followed after him. Natsu was faster, leading her to his truck and opening the passenger's door. The keys were thrown inside and Cana followed them in without much hesitation, though she knew, very distantly that it was a trap. Natsu closed her in and got in the driver's side long before she found the keys on the ground by the gas pedal.

"That was dirty."

"But effective."

"You're an asshole."

"That's the _nicest_ thing I've been called today."

Cana was at the mercy of tequila and pushed his shoulder. Natsu corrected the wheel smoothly because they were _driving_. She didn't remember him getting the truck going. "Who's saying mean things to you?"

Cana found herself abruptly in Laxus' position because Natsu was all too happy to divulge. "Lucy. She keeps trying to talk to me and…"

Tears, even the memory of them, were a harsh buzz kill. Cana said quickly, "I can't give you any advice."

"Yeah, I know your philosophy when things start to go in a direction you're _uncomfortable_ with."

"The fuck is that supposed to mean?"

He answered her question with one of his own. "Is your phone broken? I've been trying to get a hold of you for weeks."

Cana lied because it was easier that way. "I couldn't pay my bill so they took away my plan."

He bit his cheek hard, making his cheekbone stand out and rolled through a stop sign. Cana waited for him to call her out on her bullshit, the fact that she'd blocked him on Facebook and Instagram, too, but Natsu needed from her what he _always_ needed, someone to distract himself with and he couldn't have that if he was burning bridges. "That's shit."

"It's good now, though. Did you ask Zeref's friend about that garage?"

Natsu let all of his breath out in one go. "Yeah. He told me to tell you to call him but I couldn't get in contact with you."

Even drunk, she felt stupid for avoiding him and like a piece of shit for lying now. Natsu was genuinely a nice guy. Not nice like Elfman was nice and not nice like Macao was nice. He'd done his fair share of bad but he _used_ to be shiny and if she looked hard, there was still a bit of that radiance. He was the copper penny oxidized. "Is the job gone?"

"I'll talk to him again in the morning."

Cana unblocked Natsu's number while he drove her home.


	18. Chapter 18

I can be your heartache; I can be your shame.

Like so many other nights recently, Cana didn't remember falling asleep. Waking up, she was tangled in blankets from head to toe and there was a rapid and incessant hammering on her door. She rolled out of bed and got vertical only to stand in the center of her room for a moment and let it spin. Her brain engaged and she remembered what it was she was supposed to do. Dress. She was supposed to get dressed and then she was supposed to answer the door. A pair of _La Senza_ shorts were almost pushed beneath her dresser. She pulled them out and staggered into them. She found a cap-sleeved T-shirt and put that on, too.

The door was still going.

"I'm coming," she groaned and took the stairs as quickly as she dared. At the bottom, she tripped on her boots and caught herself on the stand by the door, ensuring that her wallet went flying. What it was doing there, she didn't know but now it was under the couch.

"Hell." Cana retrieved it before yanking open the door with authority. Cold air rushed inside. There was snow out there, all over her stoop and dusting the hair and shoulders of one Officer Clive. All at once, last night rushed up to greet her. Stumbling out of Laxus' car, pulling out her phone, dialing Gildarts' office because she didn't know his personal number. Her message. She couldn't recall the _details_ of that message, but judging by the look on his face, he wasn't very impressed. That not very impressed look eased away for relief.

"I've been calling you for _hours_."

"I was sleeping." Cana recoiled when a strong gust of wind brought snow and cold inside her apartment.

Gildarts asked, "Can I come in?" He was already stepping over the threshold.

"Sure, why not?" Cana backed up so she didn't get snow on her bare toes, inadvertently making a clear path for him. He stomped his boots, oblivious to her sarcasm, and scrubbed the snow out of his hair.

"I got your message. It took me some time to figure out who left it, of course, because you didn't bother leaving your name, but I called as soon as I knew. You didn't answer, I was worried." He removed his coat as he spoke and hung it up on one of the hooks over the boot rack Cana barely remembered to use. Maybe if she did, she wouldn't trip over her boots at the bottom of the stairs. "Is everything okay?"

Cana closed the door so she didn't have to look at him. She felt hot despite the sudden onslaught of winter. "I'm okay."

"Really? Because you didn't sound okay. What's going on? Did Orga approach you again?"

"No." She wanted to kick him out but beneath that want was the Cana that existed last night, the one that didn't want to play this game anymore. All she had to do was open her mouth and spit out the words.

"Then what?"

 _Come on._ "Can you just give me a second? Like, sit down or something. I'll be back." Cana hurried past him without waiting for his _okay_ and took the stairs two at a time. With the washroom door between them, she felt like she had some control. It would disappear again as soon as she had to go back downstairs.

_As soon as you have to tell him._

Cana planted her palms on the cool counter. _You could say it was nothing. That you were drunk._ Would he believe her? Maybe, until she got drunk again and left him _another_ message. Maybe she'd just blurt it over the phone. That'd be great. _Stop._

She felt sick. Nervous, mostly.

She peed. She brushed her teeth. She even brushed her hair and put on a bra from one of the many she had hanging on the bathroom door. She considered doing her makeup but that just seemed _way_ too much like avoiding.

_.Go._

Cana opened the door before she lost her nerve and took the stairs quickly with her head down. She needed the momentum, otherwise, she'd just _stop_ and this circus would continue.

Gildarts took to sitting on the couch. He'd gone outside again, though, and gotten his coffee from his car. He held it between both hands and looked at her curiously. What was he thinking? _Not that you're about to tell him you're his daughter._ Cana almost laughed manically. It was a near thing. She clamped it down and put herself a cushion down from Gildarts. She needed the space.

"So?" Gildarts prodded when Cana didn't lead.

"So?"

"You said you needed to talk to me."

"Right." She tried meeting his eyes. She tried to _not._ Neither helped. Her throat felt too tight. Gildarts' brows raised expectantly and Cana decided that if words were going to fail her, she'd figure out another way to get the conversation rolling. In the end table beside the couch was where she'd stuffed all of her family photos. She pulled out the one of her mother and her in front of the Christmas tree when she was a baby and handed it over. Gildarts accepted it cautiously, his face moving through several expressions when he recognized his ex-wife.

"Where did you get this picture?"

"Out of her house when she died."

"Died?" Gildarts looked like he'd been kicked in the teeth.

"You didn't know?" Cana reasoned.

"We didn't split on good terms," he said. "She cut me out of her life. I didn't hear anything…" He composed himself and turned the photo over before Cana could rage at him. He read the back scribbled in pen while Cana chewed a hole through her cheek. _Cornelia and Cana. Christmas '01._

"That was only months after we split…" Gildarts trailed off, looking between Cana and the picture. She forced herself to meet his eye and hoped he'd understand without her having to spell it out. Eventually, he came to the right conclusion. There was no spitting out, " _She was pregnant_?" nor was there any, " _Is this a joke?"_ Gildarts was a different breed. He let the weight of all that settle on his shoulders and Cana learned where she got her penchant for avoidance from. He dropped the photo back to the table and stood. Cana let him get his coat and his boots on without saying a thing. What was there _to_ say?

The door opened and she was traded Gildarts for a blast of wintery air.

* * *

Cana didn't know how long she sat there for, turning her picture 'round and 'round until the edges blunted beneath her fingers. It was still some time before she realized she was wrecking it, and some _more_ time before she realized that she should put it away if she wanted to keep it. She almost didn't. A small bit of reason stopped her from scrunching it up and throwing it away. It wasn't her _mother's_ fault her ex-husband was a loser. Nor was it her mother's fault that Cana couldn't think of a more ingenious way to tell her layabout father that he was, in fact, a father. She opened the cupboard again and put the picture inside the cover of a photo album she wasn't sure she'd ever open again, and then she went upstairs.

Her phone was on her bed. She must have fallen asleep with it last night. Cana picked it up and saw that Gildarts had called seven times. She cleared his number from her phone. Under those notifications was a text from Natsu.

_The job's yours if you want it._

Cana looked at Natsu's text without answering, considering her options. If she texted him back, she could get a decent job and start treading water again. If she didn't, she could do what she wanted to before and split town. There really wasn't any need for her to remain there, was there? She'd done what she came to do _years_ ago and now… now she could go _wherever_. Do _whatever_. Where was the liberation she was supposed to feel? There was a sack of bricks sitting in her stomach that she couldn't seem to shake.

Frustrated, Cana threw her phone on the bed without responding to Natsu. The square of plastic blurred in her vision. She wiped her eyes and held her breath. It wasn't enough. She looked at the ceiling and blinked rapidly. She bit her tongue _hard._ She dug her nails into her palm.

It didn't work so she started moving, opening her drawers and pulling out clothes to wear, a pair of faded and torn up jeans, a dark green V neck sweater. She left her phone where it was because she didn't want to talk to anyone she felt familiar with and took her motorcycle keys off her dresser. Thoughtful of Natsu to put them there, the last time she had to leave her bike at a bar, she'd lost the keys, too, and had to have a new set cut.

On her way out, Cana stopped in the bathroom where she brushed her hair and put on mascara but that was all the effort she cared to put forward. The last pieces of the puzzle were her combats, a scarf she picked out of a rack of them at the thrift shop and her bomber jacket. The wind made short work of cutting straight through her. Cana thought maybe she'd pack up her bike and head south. She wouldn't stop until the air got sweaty and the women dressed skimpily and the men lounged poolside, dumb and beautiful.


	19. Chapter 19

Acting like I'm heartless, I do it all the time

Nothing for Cana ever happened neatly. She used to think that it was the universe fucking with her but as she got older and, after countless therapy lessons that she didn't _love_ to reflect back on—even less now than ever before after that debacle with Mister Conbolt—she recognized a pattern. Cana Alberona's biggest saboteur was Cana Alberona. She took herself out at the knees again and again. It was like she loved the taste of dirt.

Tonight wasn't any different. She staggered through the snow, more than once narrowly avoiding getting smooshed in the streets by cars that didn't give enough time between beginning to break and stop signs. She flipped off her fair share of bad drivers and got dusted with salt for her efforts.

By the time she made it to Fairy Tail, she was frozen. Her boots were good in that they had good grip but the leather was thin and not very warm. Her jacket, likewise, wasn't really winter-ready. Less so now than before, what with that hole in the elbow.

A group of old women in a van filled the church parking lot across from Fairy Tail. They hung out the back, bundled up to their eyeballs and handed out meal and thrift store vouchers to the less fortunate as they did every year around this time. One of them saw Cana and attempted to call her over. She lengthened her steps, bringing her into Fairy Tail's parking lot where her bike hid beneath a mound of snow. She hesitated before brushing it off and getting out of there. She was frozen. And she was hungry. She could probably find someone to buy her a drink. She ducked into Fairy Tail, telling herself that one drink and a meal before she split town wasn't going to kill her.

* * *

Cana didn't know much about high fashion, what was expensive or what was not, but she had an idea that Flare, her benefactor for the night, who was dressed in something small and red and shimmering, was taking a few steps down to slum it with Fairy Tail's regulars. Was her smile too wide? Yeah. Was her laugh too wild? Sure. Did Cana _know_ that she was bad news before she sat down? It was practically written in the stars. But as her own best saboteur, it was her duty to ignore all the warning signs and take a seat.

Flare flung around money like it was her job. She bought Cana a spread of food that they shared together but left mostly unfinished, and then four shots of tequila and when that got stale, she took out a case that used to hold trading cards from the years of her youth and dotted a line of white right there on the bar. Cana watched, fascinated when she snorted it all up through a glass tube and then made a similar line for Cana. She _thought_ about looking around the bar before accepting, just not very hard. It was there that Cana recognized there that things had changed for her and she wasn't sure that it was for the better. The old Cana didn't want to do Molly with her friend. This new girl snorting something unknown off a bar?

Flare's laughter brought her leaning into Cana. Cana could barely hold her up. It was okay, though, she felt nice, warm and soft. Cana thought she could get by the crazy, at least for the night, when Flare tipped her face up and left Cana with orange lipstick stains around her mouth.

The kiss quickly escalated, Flare's hand seeking up Cana's inner thigh and brushing over sensitive parts with confident strokes. Cana was taking in a breath to sigh when a hand smacked down on the bar, scaring her.

"You can't do that in here." The bartender swirled into view. She looked mad. "You can't snort off the bar and you can't fuck on the stools, either." Cana stared at her mutely. The bartender waved at her. "Don't just sit there. Go on. Get that shit out of my bar."

Flare looped her arm through Cana's. Cana stood with her and was pulled along. Around the corner, out of the view of the bar, Flare tugged her into the bathroom. Fluorescent lights bounced off grey-white walls and fractured brown and blue art deco floors.

It was with startling force that Cana was pushed into the bathroom wall and had her jacket pulled from her hand. Did she _remember_ getting her jacket off the stool? She must have. Flare pulled down her shirt and her bra, breaking threads in both, and grabbed her forcefully. Cana couldn't really feel it to say if it felt good or not. Likewise, the door had to slam closed for her to realize that they hadn't been alone in the bathroom together. She didn't _remember_ being so careless. Or was she?

"What was that? On the bar?" A responsible person would have asked _before._

"China White."

That didn't mean much to Cana, which she figured was probably not a great thing. The room all at once spun violently and her muscles began to quiver. She waited for the feeling to lessen but it only built and built and built. The more everything spun, the more frightened she became and the more she wanted to escape. Flare was getting on her knees in front of her and pulling at her pants in a trance and Cana couldn't even appreciate the psychotic beauty of it all. She pushed Flare back. Flare came on again so Cana shoved her hard. Red hair spilled on the bathroom floor, her dress a fan when her bottom struck. Flare stared at her and blinked.

Cana had the wherewithal to pull up her shirt before yanking open the door and tripping into the bar. Men filled the hallway, blocking the exit almost completely. Cana shoved her way through them with her elbows as leverage. She couldn't _breathe_. She couldn't think. She couldn't really feel the hand clasping her shoulder, pulling her around. And then she could barely see Flare's face on the verge of rage.

"Where are you going? You can't just leave me."

Cana's tongue was a brick in her mouth. She wriggled out of Flare's grasp only to be caught again. She pushed Flare _hard_ this time and sent her careening into some man that caught her much by accident. The way to the door was clear now. Cana made a break for it. Pain radiated on her scalp. Flare had her by the hair and was pulling her around none too gently. Distantly, she knew that things would have been easier for her if she just let the crazy be but she was stupid, probably, and feeling down on herself and thinking, however buried in her mind, that some company was better than no company.

"Don't go."

"I need to get out of here." Saying it aloud set it in stone. Cana's heart fluttered like a bird in a cage. "Let go."

Flare held her in a vice. "No. You said you'd stay with me."

Had she? She couldn't _remember._ "I need out. I need—"

Flare sank to the ground on her knees, whether she tripped or just didn't want to stand anymore, and wrenched Cana's hair, bringing her down, too, onto the snowmelt on the floor. Salt dug into Cana's hands and knees. She had a hard time drawing the connection between the abuse and the beginnings of what was turning into a very, very bad trip but it was there and she felt it closing down on her with vicious speed.

"Let go of me, crazy bitch!"

Swearing at Flare only seemed to make her more agitated. She let go of Cana and then Cana's face burned. A few onlookers hissed, some laughed, others called something stupid like _fight_. Cana's face radiated pain again. She hit back and stood. Flare screamed like an animal. She was suddenly on her feet, too, and running for Cana.

Someone said, "I'm calling the cops." A vision of what her night _could_ look like flashed through Cana's not-so-sober mind. She didn't _want_ to sit in the fucking police station with Gildarts looking at her disapprovingly. Not only did she not want to, if she had an assault charge laid, she wouldn't be able to leave.

Cana braced for a collision that never came. She peeked through her lashes at a very tall and very wide and very familiar man. He'd grabbed Flare up mid-stride and held her aloft like she was a doll and not a girl. He said something like, "Easy." Cana didn't wait to see the rest of the exchange. If Elfman wanted to get involved, she'd take advantage of it and get the hell out of there.

Cold air sliced into her arms and midriff. It took her several minutes of rapid walking to realize it was because she wasn't wearing her coat. She wasn't even holding it. "Fuck." Fuck. Fuck. _Fuck._ She looked back over her shoulder but couldn't see Fairy Tail. In fact, she didn't _recognize_ where she was. On some little side street where the houses were far too nice.

Cana spun a circle. And then another. And then she didn't know which way she came from. Snow was falling heavily from the sky and blasting into her. Wrapping her arms around her middle didn't help much so she found a spot between two houses where the wind didn't reach so readily and put her back against the brick. She couldn't shiver, that basic function was lost on her, though she knew she was cold. Had to be, right? On the other hand, if she didn't _feel_ the cold, then maybe she wasn't _actually_? She laughed. And then she cried, and that was how Stars in the Sky found her, curled up in the snow in a tank top, lost and too high.

* * *

"I don't know what to do, Natsu. She's been asleep for like, twelve hours. What if she never wakes up? Yeah. Yeah, I did. She said… um… White… White China? Maybe? Yeah. Yeah, that was it. China White. Well, of _course,_ she's still breathing. I wouldn't be calling you if she _wasn't_ , geez. I'm not dumb."

Hair that smelled like cherries fell over Cana's face and cold metal dropped over her lips. An earring dangling from an ear. Cana had seen this move before at a CPR course her social assistance program made her take. It made her more employable, they said.

"Yeah, she's breathing." Something was said and Cana's saviour responded with, "Well, I hadn't checked in a little while." More words. "Don't freak out on me, I'm freaking out!" Ragged breathing. "Okay. Okay. I'll give her another twenty minutes and then I'm calling an ambulance. They have stuff for overdoses, right? Naloxone or something." A drawn-out pause. "You're going to come?" It was that hopefulness that gave her away. The hopefulness that burgeoned with hopelessness. _Love_ , Cana thought. This was a girl in love and there was only one person she knew that loved Natsu so completely.

She groaned aloud and Lucy dropped her phone, startled. "Cana? Cana, are you awake?" Lucy picked up her phone again. "I think she's waking up. I'll call you back, okay?" The phone dropped to the ground and hands pressed on either side of Cana's cheeks. "Cana?"

Natsu was a fool, Cana thought when she saw Lucy's gold-flecked eyes. A stupid, stupid fool for turning her down and pushing her away. What a nice way to wake up. Then her mouth started watering. She pushed Lucy's hands away and rolled. Her knees smarted against a hardwood floor.

Lucy was a smart girl; she didn't need Cana to gasp for a bathroom. "Straight ahead."

Cana scrabbled across the room and made it just in time.

* * *

Peppermint tea greeted Cana when she emerged again forty minutes later, showered, mouth washed and in clothing that wasn't hers. Lucy's tights were a little loose and a little short, she was a voluptuous sort, fuller than Cana in a lot of ways. The sweater she wore was supposed to be tightfitting but Cana couldn't fill it out the way Lucy could. She felt like a fraud in cashmere and wool socks. A fraud that toed her way through plush carpets in a princess-style bedroom and stood awkwardly in front of Lucy's table. Once upon a time, Cana imagined Lucy had tea parties there with dolls. It seemed she wanted to graduate to real girls because Lucy was already sitting and there was another place set out for Cana. She sat somewhat reluctantly. It felt rude to _not_ when Lucy went through the trouble.

"You really saved my ass last night. Thanks."

Lucy pushed the tea on her. "What happened?"

She was in the wrong place to tell her Flare story. Tales like that belonged in Assisted Housing, not this… whatever the hell it was. Mansion? Was it fair to call it a mansion? Cana had never been in one before but she thought _yes_.

Lucy was still waiting for her to respond. Cana cleared her throat. "Just… Had a bad night."

It was obvious she was dying to know more. Cana understood morbid curiosity, it's what led her to this place, to begin with. She prepared for the usual questions, who was she out with, what went so sour, how did she end up on the wrong side of town in just a tank top? Lucy came at her with something she could answer even _less_ than any of the above. "Why do you treat yourself like this?"

And what could she say?

Tires rolled over the snowy driveway, distracting Lucy and saving Cana from a weak reply. "My dad was supposed to be out of town…" Lucy stood and checked. Her face went pinched and pale and Cana knew without her ever saying anything that it was Natsu. It was shitty of her but she downed her last gulp of tea and stood. "Thanks for taking care of me, Lucy, it was really sweet of you. I'll bring your clothes back." It was inadequate. That was the best she had, though. She chose a door that she thought was the exit and came out into a hallway painted a warm green. A spiraled staircase led down to what looked to be a foyer. Cana saw her boots sitting on a mat by the front door and cheered silently.

"Cana, wait." Lucy was on her heels. Cana took the stairs as fast as she dared, everything was still wobbly and she felt like garbage. She touched the bottom landing as gracefully as she could have hoped and yanked on her boots.

"Cana—"

Cana opened the front door. Snow was falling from the sky again; it got caught in Natsu's faded pink hair. He stopped halfway up the walkway. "Hey, you're up—"

"Take me home?" Cana cut in.

Natsu looked at Lucy standing in her doorway; Cana didn't have the heart to join him and see the expression she wore. "Yes or no?"

"Yeah," he said eventually. "Yeah, I'll drive you home."

Cana shuffled by him and got into the passenger's side of his truck. Natsu joined her a second later and started it up. It cost him something to drive away; he was giving, though. Cana couldn't even rightly appreciate it, she just kept thinking about Lucy's guileless question. _'Why do you treat yourself like this?'_


	20. Chapter 20

I keep a close watch on this heart of mine

Cana's breath fogged up Natsu's window. The coolness from the glass seeped through and anchored her in ways that peppermint tea just couldn't. Natsu drove considerately, taking his corners slowly, and kept the music on level four so Cana could only partially hear Johnny Cash's deep voice.

Natsu gave her some time. A whole two minutes, to be exact. "What were you doing there?"

"I got turned around last night," Cana said to the window.

"And just happened to show up at Lucy's?"

She looked at him sideways and saw what he was trying to get at. "I didn't intend on it. I just met this girl, she was fucking _weird._ I knew she was weird but I thought… I don't know what I thought. I needed to get away from her, though, and I ended up wandering around without my coat and Lucy found me."

Some of his edge fell away. "I heard about the fight at Fairy Tail." He reached over one-handed and pushed her hair back from her temple. Cana was reminded all over again of her black eye. It wasn't _bad_ but she'd never had one before and she wasn't super fond of it.

"How did you hear about it?"

"Small town," he responded. He let his hand drop. "Does it hurt?"

"It doesn't feel good."

Both hands were on the wheel again. Natsu took a left at the lights and Cana's building came into view. "What was that all about?"

"I don't know," Cana said truthfully. "She was fine and then she wasn't."

"I meant, why were you snorting China White off the bar with some crazy chick?"

Oh. "Just had a bad day." That was the understatement of the year. The closer they came to the Patch, the clearer a bright yellow vehicle could be seen out front of Cana's apartment. It would only be a second before Natsu saw and identified the vehicle. To avoid awkward conversations, she was hit with a thread of spontaneity. "Can you help me pick up my bike from Fairy Tail?"

"Right now?" Natsu asked.

"The roads are too sloppy to drive it home," she explained quickly. Did he notice her frantic examining of the parking lot?

He took off his blinker and accelerated past the cul-de-sac road. He did look down there and he did see the yellow car. She didn't think he knew it was Gildarts', though.

"Thanks a million," Cana breathed. Natsu was troubled and didn't say much either way. Johnny Cash silenced for the Eurythmics' _Sweet Dreams._ Cana tangled her hands together and rested her cheek against the window once more.

"I tried calling you yesterday," Natsu hedged.

"I left my phone at home." She didn't have to lie this time.

"Zeref's friend's waiting on an answer."

Cana sighed and pulled one leg up to her chest, wrapping her arm around it.

"What's that mean?"

"That means I don't know."

Natsu looked at her skeptically. "You don't know?"

"Things are really messed up for me right now," she replied weakly.

"So this'll be an opportunity to change that." He looked uncomfortable saying it, the words unfamiliar from his mouth. They belonged to Gildarts. Cana tried to hate him for it. She was too tired.

"When does he want me to start?"

"Tomorrow," Natsu said. "Seven."

"In the morning?"

"That's what time garages usually open up, right?"

"Yeah." Of course.

"Okay?"

"Yeah."

"For real, Cana, because I don't like asking this guy for favours and neither does Zeref, so if I'm going to tell him you'll show up, you have to show."

"Yeah," she said with more authority. "Yes, I'll be there." Which meant no more benders with fucking crazy girls.

Natsu fishtailed his truck into Fairy Tail's parking lot and pulled up next to her bike. Together, they brushed off the snow and again, together, they lifted it into the bed of the truck. Really, the Dakota was too small for this kind of transport. Natsu had tie straps that they used liberally to try to hold it in place.

"I'll drive slow," he promised and almost kept to his word, only taking a few corners at speeds fast enough to make the bike rock threateningly.

Cana was relieved to see that Gildarts had gone by the time they returned. Natsu saw the fresh tire tracks and the note left on the door. He even read the words, _Call me, Cana. -Gildarts_ , Cana caught him spying over her shoulder after they'd removed her bike from the back of his truck. Her glare had very little effect on him.

"Did you get yourself into trouble last night?"

"Someone said they were going to call the cops," Cana said vaguely and stuffed the note in her pocket.

He knew something wasn't quite right, though. When the cops wanted you, they didn't leave personal notes on your door. "Last night when I went by his place, Gildarts was smashed and you're _usually_ fucked up but you've been acting like it's Armageddon. What's going on?"

"Nothing." Cana opened her door and entered her apartment with authority, hoping that would suffice for an answer. Natsu was a tenacious sort and wasn't so easily cowed or intimidated by her taciturn response.

"Bullshit, nothing. Did something happen? Like what happened with that therapist?"

"God. _No_." Cana cussed. "What the fuck is wrong with you and where did you even hear that from?"

"Small town," Natsu supplied again.

Cana was suddenly mad. The urge to lash out was almost overwhelming but a look at Natsu's sincere and concerned face brought her crashing to a halt.

"Talk to me, Cana, tell me what's going on."

It was that, more than anything, that broke her down. Simple words with very little substance behind them. Sincere, though. He cared, those words said, not in the same way he cared about Lucy but in a way that was very real and she wasn't quite quick enough to push at him and keep him at arm's length. Her eyes filled up and spilled over and wetted his shoulder because suddenly, he was hugging her. Struggling to get away didn't matter, he was stronger than she was and just as determined to keep her where she was. Eventually, Cana stopped trying to escape and even returned his hold, though much limper.

They stood like that for several long moments, Natsu supporting most of Cana's weight, then he pulled back slightly. Cana thought that meant she was free but he took her to the couch and sat and pulled her in. She willingly put her head on his shoulder, it was the only way to keep him from seeing her completely vulnerable.

Natsu let her exist in a place where she sniffled and didn't speak for a solid twenty minutes, then, with a patience that said he'd done this a few times before, in the past, he pulled out a crinkled tissue from his pocket and handed it to her and asked the dreaded question. "Tell me what happened."

And she did. Somehow, after revealing the truth to Gildarts yesterday, this was easier. Natsu was surprisingly good at listening, holding in all of his astonishment and waiting until the very end to breathe out and say, "Wow."

"He hates me," Cana lamented.

"He probably doesn't hate you."

"You didn't see him just walk out yesterday."

"Why would he leave you that note then?"

"Probably to tell me that I'm eighteen and not his problem and to fuck off."

"Gildarts isn't like that."

Cana held in her opinions on the matter. How well did she even know him? He was the Constable that picked her up again and again for various infractions, mainly drinking in public, he was the guy whose bike she'd fixed. But beyond that? What else did she know? He was a do-gooder that tried to help people like Natsu, who wanted to get better.

He had his plate full.

Natsu kicked off his boots, there was water stains on the floor now under his feet and hers, and lay back on the couch, bringing a limp Cana with him. His reach extended to the coffee table. He grabbed the TV remote and turned on Teletoon Retro. The Jetsons were playing. Cana watched the screen without really comprehending what was going on. Eventually, she got tired of watching Rosie zip around and dust, adding comical jibs here and there and closed her eyes, and after that, Natsu's warmth and the gentle rise and fall of his chest put her into a more restful sleep than she'd had before on Lucy's floor.

The Jetsons was long over by the time she opened her eyes again, now it was Tom and Jerry playing. Natsu was still there trapped beneath her, though he was looking like he was searching for a way up. She realized why a heartbeat later. Someone was at her door.

She knew immediately that it was Gildarts. Part of her wanted to run, part of her wanted to sink back into the couch and ignore him. Another part still wanted to get up and let him in.

Natsu realized she was awake and slid out from beneath her. Cana watched him flex his fingers at his side like they'd gone numb trapped beneath her body. He used his other hand to open her door and sure enough, there was Gildarts, just as snow-dusted as before. It was storming again.

"Hey, Natsu." Gildarts' voice was subdued. He looked over Natsu's shoulder and saw Cana on the couch. She only met his eyes for a second, pretending to find the TV more interesting. In truth, she watched him like a hawk in her periphery as he gathered Natsu's coat off the back of the chair without asking him in so many words to leave, and held it open for him, patting his shoulders in a fatherly manner when it was on. She listened closely, too, when he told Natsu, "Careful in the storm. Text me when you get home."

Natsu came back to the couch and grabbed his boots. "I'll talk to you later, Cana."

She didn't have much to say in response, a grunt that may have been goodbye. The door opened and closed, Natsu's Dakota roared to life. Tires crunched over snow and then there was only the sound of Tom and Jerry. A baby elephant was sucking up peanuts through the bottom of a door and rushing them across the floor. Tom chased them to a room but couldn't get the door open where, on the other side, the elephant and Jerry waited. It was supposed to be funny; Cana couldn't even crack a smile.

Gildarts' weight dropped onto the couch where Natsu had been. He didn't sit back or relax, his shoulders were as stiff as rebar. He looked tired, too, a little hungover, perhaps. Cana could sympathize. She still felt weird. Probably because she hadn't eaten anything all day and the sky was starting to get dark.

Gildarts didn't waste any time jumping into things. "You caught me off guard yesterday."

"What was I supposed to say? Brace yourself, the life you walked away from's come back on you?"

"It wasn't like that."

"Then what was it like?"

Gildarts grumbled and said instead, "You could have said _something_ , at least."

"How was I supposed to? You walked _out_."

Gildarts put his elbows on his knees and rested his face in his hands. It was a practiced pose; he'd been doing that a lot over the last few hours. "You surprised me," he said again. He lifted his eyes; a person couldn't fake that kind of remorse. "Cana, if I _knew_ she was pregnant…"

Cana had an entire arsenal of nasty things that she could say, things she'd been stewing on since he walked out of her house yesterday. Her throat was a vice choking out her words.

"That's in the past, though. All I have is right now. I've thought about it and I want to make it better. I cleaned out the Bunkie last night and made a spot for your bike in the barn if you want. I started making dinner before I came over, too, but then I didn't know if you liked spaghetti and meatballs and—"

Cana was still stuck several sentences back. "Cleaned out the Bunkie?"

Gildarts looked to be on a mission to not be sidetracked. "I guess it's a little too late to tell you that you can't have boys over." He laughed and it was forced. "Do I still get a say in _which_ boys, though? Let's start with that troll Gajeel Redfox." Then he looked horrified. "Do you even still talk to him? You don't, do you? But you're going to now, I bet—"

"Stop." Cana stood and began to pace. What was _wrong_ with the men in her life? Why did they all want her to pick up her things and just _move_? "Just stop," she repeated. Gildarts was already quiet. It took her a bit of a while to articulate what she was thinking and then it wasn't even what she _wanted_ to say. "I don't talk to Gajeel." Hell, she barely even remembered him.

"That's good. He's into some weird shit—"

"Shut _up,_ " Cana interrupted. "God." Where did this penchant for nervous talk come from? She'd never seen Gildarts so out of sorts. She made a circuit of the room and came back. She spat out, "I don't want any of this."

"Any of?"

"I don't want to pretend to be this family that we're not. So, now that you know, you can just… keep doing you and I'll keep doing me and everything will be like it was. Nothing's different."

Gildarts looked mad at first, and then a look of determination came over him. "Do you like spaghetti and meatballs?"

"Did you even hear me?" Cana asked.

"Everything's different, Cana," he said with such authority that she believed him. "Do you like spaghetti and meatballs? Yes, or no?"

"I don't know." She felt foolish responding. "I guess."

"Good. Come over tonight. We'll have dinner and talk some more." There was little room for debate. He stood and got his outerwear. He hesitated by the door before leaving, though, and stared at her for long enough that Cana felt uncomfortable. He made a move like he was going to hug her. Cana put out her arm to keep him away.

"No."

He wore a look of disappointment while he pulled on his jacket, giving Cana the impression that he wasn't going to give up so easily.


	21. Chapter 21

You said I tasted famous, so I drew you a heart but now, I'm not an artist, I'm a fucking work of art.

* * *

Iron and grease was a soothing smell; coupled with the feel of metal under her hands and Cana knew a kind of peace she once thought was beyond her.

It was getting late; the sun was sinking in the early spring sky. Still, she tolled by the fluorescent overhead lights, putting the last touches on the bike she was working on. It was legal, sure, but the stamps on its body made her think that its owner may have done illegal things. Natsu and his brother knew some strange people, and now she did, too, by proxy.

That was fine. She never overstepped her bounds or asked too many questions and no one ever reprimanded her for it. When she did good work on a customer's bike, she sometimes got a bonus, and her boss made sure to check all of her work so she never handed anything back half-assed.

There would be one day, she figured, when he wouldn't make sure to look over everything she touched. When that time came, she'd have a tattoo on her arm that marked her as an official ally of an organization that skated, somewhat ineffectually, under the watchful eye of the law.

She cranked the last bolt into place on the engine just as the outer door opened and cold air rushed into the shop. Cana looked up, expecting to see the owner of the bike, but was met by someone new.

"We're closed."

"I know."

Cana stood and rubbed her hands on the grease rag. "Then what do you want, Elfman?"

He leaned against the service desk like he belonged there, large and hulking, and this side of intimidating, if she was honest with herself. "It's been awhile."

"Because you were telling me stupid shit last time we were together."

He lifted the corner of his mouth. "I've moved past that."

"Suddenly, you don't love me anymore?"

"I'm not even sure I like you."

Cana felt an undeniable thrill. "Feeling's mutual."

Elfman said, "There's a party tonight."

"I heard; Mira's got her own place."

"You should come."

"If that's what Mira wanted, she should have stopped by herself."

"And you should have picked up the phone months ago and called her," Elfman returned.

Cana's cheeks warmed. "Thanks for the advice."

"Will you go?"

"With you?"

"I didn't want a date," Elfman said.

"You just wanted a girl to fuck at the end of the night?" Cana posed.

"Or before it." He'd gotten bold in the time they spent apart. Another thrill took her as she imagined his hand around her throat, and then his thumb in her mouth and his body filling her up.

"In the theatre again?"

"Or here."

"This is where I _work_ ," she reminded him.

"There's no one here and it's after hours." He was stiff; he couldn't hide _that_ and didn't try _._ Elfman knew Cana's weaknesses almost better than Cana did herself and when he caught her staring too long, he both grabbed his dick and held out his hand.

Taking his invitation, she thought that somehow, nothing had changed, though at the same time, nothing was the same.


End file.
